Infinite Stratos: The Holy Grail War
by zerosaber0
Summary: The sequel to my first story Beyond the Black. In a world where the Fate world is destroyed, a refugee mage seeks harbor within the IS universe. However, so has the Grail, and one again brings with it the calamity known as the Holy Grail War.
1. Ch 0  Prequel to the Sequel

Ch. 0 – Prequel to the Sequel

Author's Note: Since this is the first, no zeroth, chapter, this will be the only author's note that precedes the story.

Anyways, this is the story that I really wanted to write ever since my friend started me on Beyond the Black. Of course, I treated that as NaNoWriMo fodder, therefore I had absolutely no planning, no character sheets, no anything except an idea and a crap load of time.

Then I came up with this crossover and I was like, "I already started this story. How can I get here from there?"

Answer: Finish the first story, then do the second one properly. Of course, since it's basically NaNoWriMo fodder, I'm none too proud of it, especially the Mary Sue, yet I want people to get a feel for the background to this story. Hence, prequel summary. This one was written off the cuff like my last (ok, first ever) story, but the actual chapters should have some degree of planning.

The story takes place after Chifuyu defeats the winged black IS in my previous story, but I'll put in enough information so that you guys know what else happened in Beyond the Black. Underlined things are topics explored in the anime, feel free to skip them if you know it.

* * *

><p><span>In a world where science has evolved in a single leap rather than a slow crawl, the entire planet's focus had shifted to the development of Infinite Stratos (IS), humanoid suits of mechanized armor straight out of the pages of science fiction. Piloted by the most skilled women in the world, they were the world's protectors against the incredible power of disaster and the world's best deterrent for war.<span>

10 years ago, while the world struggled for power with nuclear weapons, a pure white IS emerged out of nowhere, a spectacle of glistening metal and mysterious power, nicknamed the White Knight by the media.

Simultaneously, over 1,000 conventional missiles from multiple countries launched, as if in response to this beautiful machine. Afterward, the countries affected would claim hacking to be the cause of firing, if they wanted to destroy their target they would use bigger guns. But this was simply an attempt for those countries to save face, for the pure white IS had destroyed every single missile with a weapon certainly meant for melee, detonating their warheads prematurely.

One would expect the explosions to still have some effect on the IS: whether it be singe marks from the heat, cracks from the pressure and shrapnel, or at the very least a layer of ash coating the machine. But alas, not even a speck of dust marred the perfect finish of this legendary machine. As abruptly as it appeared, it vanished. A woman named Shinonono Tabane of Japan (family name first), claimed responsibility for the creation of the IS. Claiming that the original purpose was for space exploration, she distributed IS cores around the world, asking for the world's help in future development. Afterwards she disappeared, just as abruptly as the pure white IS had.

With these cores in hand, countries began development of the IS, but soon the scientific purpose of exploration had been perverted by the world government's lust for power. With the display of the White Knight's power still fresh in their minds, a small arms race began. It was estimated to reach Cold War standards when the leaders of the countries, finally realizing what was about to happen, agreed to meet in the American state of Alaska to forge a treaty of equality and nonaggression to prevent such a tragedy from happening again.

With this Pact, the nations created a system to both limit the weapon development a country could pursue and create an academy to train new IS pilots. Known as the IS Academy, students enrolled and staff had no official affiliation to any countries nor organizations. They were treated as a sovereign city-state that any other country could call upon for help for events out of their ability to handle. Due to some unknown reason, only women were able to pilot IS. At least, until one fateful day when a boy name Orimura Ichika of Japan accidentally wandered into the cargo area were an IS was kept for the demonstration later that day. He reached out and touched the machine, activating its servos and accomplishing what no other man had done since the creation of the machine. Immediately, he was sent to the academy, his admission expedited by his sister who taught there. He was given a customized personal IS by the name of Byakushiki, trained hard and became one of the best IS pilots in his year. His story was tapped to be adapted into an anime series, with a second one hopefully to come. But the studio researching his story had found another one, buried deep within the archives of the Academy. Printed onto a stack of yellowed paper hidden behind a false book cover was the story of two other girls, ones that didn't stand out as much as Ichika had, but happened to be indirectly responsible for the bloodiest conflict in the world's history: the Holy Grail War.

* * *

><p>Sever Panganiban and Natalia Fairs were half-sisters, both direct inheritors of the Fairs fortune after the Fairs family had careened off the side of a cliff. Natalia, protected by her mother's embrace, was the only one to survive the descent, but suffered multiple injuries. It wasn't until a lucky legal assistant discovered evidence of the existence of Natalia's half-sister Sever. Born to a woman who died in childbirth, Sever was whisked to America to be posthumously adopted by the Fairs family in order to uphold the words of the will. She immediately spent her time taking care of her long-lost half sister, creating a bond with Natalie that lasted for years, evolving into a love Sever couldn't comprehend and wouldn't notice. However, it was not her role to understand Natalia's love, but to use her position as an heir to the Fairs family to receive admission into the IS Academy.<p>

The girl Natalia thought of as Sever Panganiban was actually an assassin for the terrorist cell Phantom Task. Usurping her identity, the assassin had murdered the real Sever. Trained from an early age to do everything well, her mission was to get enrolled into IS Academy and receive formal training and experience in IS piloting. The plan worked better than expected, the Academy even granting her a personal IS with an ability that could be considered omnipotent, if it hadn't had so many limitations. Once she had graduated, Phantom Task would have a professionally trained IS soldier and become more of a threat to the safety of the world. However, a certain wrench called love was thrown into the plan when Sever actively interrupted and caused the failure of a certain mission to infiltrate the Academy with an unmanned IS and abduct Natalia. Having created her own bond with Natalia and regretting her violent past, Sever rebelled against her former organization, seeking asylum within the Academy itself. With the infiltration a failure and an unviable repeat tactic, Phantom Task entrusted both Sever's fate and Natalia's purpose to one of their high-ranking officers: Codename X.

A man of great intellect and foresight, X was not only the man who had trained Sever as a child, but also masterminded the entire plot to replace the true Sever with the current Sever. Officially, he was the commander of Germany's Schwarzer Hase, the German IS team led by Laura Bodewig. With his authority and power, he was able to obtain via legal channels a late transfer for Laura into IS Academy and proceeded to lead Laura into battle against Sever. With weapons barely weak enough to pass under the terms of the Alaska Pact (and a rail gun that blew it into shards of paper), X planned for Sever to be either killed or severely injured in her battle with Laura. In order to ensure that the staff wouldn't be able to interfere, he crudely hacked the arena the two were in, trapping them within like some sort of private gladiator fight. Unfortunately, Sever proved to be too much for Laura, especially after slipping into the crazed berserker mode X had cultivated in her during her training. He sent another unmanned IS both rescue Laura and to eliminate the weakened Sever, but unbeknownst to him Sever had survived his deadly attack.

The next day, Sever launched her own preemptive attack against X, somehow tracking the man via traces from his earlier hacking. Unleashing the fury and anger that had been building up ever since she met Natalia, she soundly defeated both X and his two unmanned IS in a destructive first strike. She recovered both X and as much of the IS as possible, bringing them back to the Academy for them to interrogate the man and to research the IS. However, due to Sever's careless handling of X (due to the hate she had for him), interrogation proved impossible until he was well enough to talk.

However, even this was just part of the gambit X had devised. Knowing that the Academy's beach trip would be coming soon, he executed his real plan. Before Sever left for the beach trip, X activated a program within the nano-machines inside of Natalia, given to her by a Phantom Task infiltrator back when she was being treated for the car accident all those years program caused Natalia to exhibit symptoms similar to stomach flu, a serious but treatable disease that ensured she wouldn't be allowed to go.

With the rest of the first years (including Sever) gone, X escaped his confined recuperation and approached Natalia. Coincidentally, Natalia had discovered a record of Sever's experiences to this point, as well as her past. The truth about her sister had disturbed the girl to the point where X found it incredibly easy to control her, even able to convince the girl to infect herself with DG cells. Together, they built an IS out of the recovered IS parts the Academy had and goaded Sever to return prematurely by faking Natalia's kidnapping. X had the two sisters fight, using a system he called Valkyrie Upper to equalize the girl's difference in strength and battle experience.

Valkyrie Upper was a system that copied the battle experiences of a certain host and copied them into another using specific types of nano-machines: called Valkyrie Host and Valkyrie Parasite respectively. It turned out the X had implanted Valkyrie Host into Sever at the beginning of her term with Phantom Task and every battle she had only added to the wealth of experience X could endow on any person at the push of the button. It turned out that Valkyrie Parasite had a glitch that caused it to induce certain sicknesses when certain subroutines were program, evidence that the nano-machines planted in Natalia long ago were Valkyrie Parasite. It also inferred that Phantom had their hands around this girl for quite a long time, now finally ready to use her.

Under the effects of the machine, Natalia's DG cells also activated, automatically healing her from every injury but giving her the appearance of the robot used to pilot unmanned IS. This ability equalized the differences in specs between the two girls' machines: Sever's being a precision made instrument formatted to her exact needs while Natalia's was a mishmash of partially damaged parts. So X activated the next Level of the Valkyrie Upper, copying more of Sever into Natalia and forcing a 1st shift in her IS.

The 1st shift transformed Natalia's IS mishmash into a beautiful silver angel, formatted to fit Natalia's specific needs. With the balance now heavily tilted in her favor, Natalia effortlessly defeated Sever and retreated away to the Phantom Task base in Hawaii, in reality Natalia's villa overtaken by Phantom Task troops.

Sever was still alive, however, and without official permission to do so, flew to Hawaii to try to rescue Natalia. However, X had sent Natalia out to fight against the other personal IS users, under the pretense of a wild AI that took over their IS and needing the Academy's involvement to control the situation. After raising hell and causing mass chaos that reduced the number of combat-capable troops on the base to 2, Sever was captured and used to complete the Valkyrie Upper.

Natalia was intercepted by Ichika and the other personal IS users of the first year: Cecilia Alcott of England, Ling Yin Huang of China, Charlotte Dunois of France, Shinonono Houki of Japan (also Shinonono Tabane's little sister), and Laura Bodewig, whom Ichika gained the loyalty of after saving her. The team had driven Natalia into a corner, so X responded by activating the completed Valkyrie Upper. This effectively replaced Natalia's mind with one modeled after Sever's berserker mode but with an AI directing the chaos. It also forced Natalia's IS to evolve to 2nd shift, growing a pair of wings of energy. Now a mindless drone, Natalia ruthlessly cut down Ichika and his team, until Ichika finally impaled the silver IS with his sword, deactivating the IS when its energy hit zero. Unknowingly, he had also severely injured Natalia within her robotic shell, her blood instantly cauterizing due to the heat from his energy blade, then healing once he retracted it.

At this time, X had confirmed the deactivation of the silver IS. Under the guise of an official US communique, he took responsibility for the IS and sent all of his active men to recover the IS disguised as US forces, heavily armed in case of Natalia's IS was unable to differentiate friend from foe.

However, Ichika's sister and instructor, Orimura Chifuyu had received a message from a trusted individual in the US doubting the officialism of the request in the first place. Aware of Sever's past as a terrorist, Chifuyu unofficially ordered both the recovery of the silver IS Ichika and his team had taken down, as well as the interception of the "US recovery" team.

Ichika, Houki, and Chifuyu herself went to intercept the recovery team while the other personal IS users recovered the silver IS. While the recovery was accomplished safely, Natalia's IS still without energy to even move, Ichika's team encountered the recovery team and obliterated them with an untested attack.

Luckily, the pilot survived the attack, and from him got the location of the Phantom Task base on Hawaii. They travelled there and arrived just in time to rescue a fleeing boy who from a massive black IS, armed to the teeth with massive optical weaponry. Using the same obliterating attack they had used before, they destroyed the black IS and allowed it to fall into the water.

However, the black IS had repaired itself, injuring Ichika with a surprise attack. Now with a pair of purple wings, similar to Natalia's silver IS, the black IS overpowered the remaining Houki, who protected the disabled Ichika. Finally, calling forth her own IS, Chifuyu destroyed the black IS completely by first cutting the black IS into small chunks of metal, then vaporizing them with a wave of energy from Houki's most powerful weapon.

With Ichika treated and the boy safe, Ichika's group got their first good look at him. To Ichika and Chifuyu, even though very similar in looks to her, they were distinctly aware that this was not the same Sever they had gotten to know. But Houki thought differently, seeing the boy as the same exact Sever, even if her Sever was a girl. To prove his identity (and gender), the boy exposed himself to the group, causing Houki to faint in prudish shock.

With Houki unconscious, Kail proceeded to explain that the completion of the Valkyrie Upper had cost Sever her life. He had then used the last embers of her existence to intrude upon their world. When asked for what purpose, he simply answered "To fight a war."


	2. Ch 1 Returning to the Normal Flow

Ch.1 – Returning to the Normal Flow

Disclaimer: Infinite Stratos and the Fate universe belong to the original creators. Any use of them is strictly for non-profitable and non-derogatory purposes, covered under the Fair Use Act.

* * *

><p><em>Prompt: What was the last dream you ever had?<em>

_I awoke staring at what I knew to be a plain ceiling, no matter what my eyes wanted to tell me. Lying in a mattress on the floor of a decoration-less room, I closed my eyes in a futile attempt to return to slumber. It was just a matter of minutes before that stubborn slavedriver came to rouse me from my fake rest and work._

_I spent the majority of that day in the test lab, hanging on for dear life on the side of a rampaging IS, its pilot still not used to the enhanced ability reinforcement gave an IS. The slightest uncontrolled twitch of the pilot sent the IS spinning in circles, the centrifugal force sending me flying away multiple times, each ending up as a sickening splat on the wall that should've killed me if it weren't for the self-reinforcement I had on continually as a result of this outcome._

_At the end of the productive day, I dragged myself through the halls back to my plain room. I sat down in "seiza", closed my eyes, and focused my awareness down to a fine point. With that fine point I mentally drew it over the pressure points on my body, noticing how slight pricks caused what was left of my od to surge. This simple joy was one of the few things I had enjoyed about my work: the drain of so much of my od had made my body extra-sensitive, as if an aura of total awareness exuded around my entire body. With this heightened sensitivity, I felt a small pressure differential as the door opened and closed without a sound. I felt small vibrations in the floor betray a certain person's presence as she attempted to sneak up on me. I felt the feeling of static in the air disappear as she drew close, a lesson learned from her last attempt. It became a test of endurance, how long I could hold my meditation versus how long she could refrain from disturbing me._

_As usual, I lost: my lips searching out and reaching the very tip of her nose. With a small laugh of victory, she readjusted her height and returned my gentle touch with an awkward but determined kiss._

"_I don't suppose you'll want to lead today?" I teased her._

"_Not a chance, I've been waiting for this for an entire week," she mumbled, moving her ear closer to my mouth, ready for me to get to work. Filled with new vigor, I gently nibbled the ear of the girl, listening to the contented moans of pleasure forming unbidden in her throat. I felt hot tears fall from her eyes into my shoulder, the language of tears shared by separated lovers. Those tears told me of the depths of sadness my positive reaction to her presence had filled up, fathoms of worry about how my feelings might have changed in the time we've been apart erased for the time being. I returned her tears with my own, telling her of my same sadness and worry for her feelings in return. I straightened up and stood on my bed in order to match her height while in her IS, a comfortable position for the two of us._

_With my eyes open, I sought out spots on her face, watching as the silver and gold that made up her body swirl in exotic and extravagant patterns. She could hide no reaction from me, I could tell by watching the patterns just how she really felt about certain attacks. Her ear had given me a spike of silver encased with a sliver of gold, a sure sign that she enjoyed the attention, but when I sucked her cheek, I saw a flat plain of golf with hardly any silver, although she did react physically. The corner of her mouth saw a recovery of the silver peak, followed by a golden valley of disappointment as I touched the point of her chin. For a short moment, I had revived the silver spire, but it quickly degenerated into an angry ripple as she realized I actively avoided her lips._

_Before she could use her IS's enhanced strength to force me from my pace, I moved down to her neck, crating starburst of alternating silver and gold as I gently sucked and blew onto her skin. Distracted by the intense impulses from my lips, the strength left her arms and she rest them heavily on my back. I ventured into the unknown of her upper torso, exposed to the air by her skimpy IS pilot suit. Stopping just short of her bust-line, I explored this new territory, the only thing keeping my lust from taking control being the promise we shared so long ago: To consummate our love as responsible, married adults. Instead, I watched as each new spot created a new shape of color within my love's body. Her armpit gave me a wildflower of gold and silver, her cleavage giving me fireworks. This last action exhausted my lover, causing her to dismiss the IS and fall on top of me onto my mattress. I embraced the girl tightly, while she responded by nuzzling her head into a dry portion of his shirt._

"_You tried some new things," she muffled into my chest."How did I look today?"_

"_I saw a whole bunch of patterns I had never seen from you before," I reported back with a wistful tone I wasn't used to hearing out of my mouth. "Flowers, fireworks, but I think I forgot something."_

"_You did," she agreed, taking my head into her hands and dragging herself forward to meet my lips.I closed my eyes, not only to respect the purity of her kiss, but to protect my eyes from the explosion of color that pulsed when our lips met. The intensity of the the silver and gold threatened to burn my eyes out even more with their light, thankfully fading quickly as she released the kiss._

_With teary eyes and a rosy blush I just knew was spreading on my face, I asked her, "Just how long was it since we last did that?"_

"_3 months, 6 days, 22 hours, 5 minutes, no, 6 minutes ago," she informed me, her impeccable memory once again coming in handy for answering rhetorical questions._

"_Far too long for my taste," I replied, supplying the answer I really wanted to hear._

"_Agreed, but tomorrow, we'll finally be recognized as proper adults. We'll be able to get married, have children, and raise a family, and live happily ever after under our own power," she attempted to console me, but it ended up having the opposite effect. _

_I released my embrace and turned away from her, complaining," Yeah, for as long as this body will allow me to."_

_From behind me, she resumed the hug, wrapping her arms around my waist._

"_Don't worry, it'll be all right. We finally found the last Master and Servant. Tomorrow, I'll win the battle, the war, and the Grail, and we'll take care of it. I promise," and she hugged even tighter._

"_Coming from you, I can actually believe that," I admitted, my voice filled with honesty. _

"_Hey," I nudged her, changing the subject._

"_Yeah?" She responded, her voice muffled due to pressing her face into my back._

"_I love you, I love you so – AHH!" She bit into my side fat just as I got to the good part. With a non-damaging but firm bite, she stayed latched on no matter how much I twisted and turned._

"_PWEH!" she spat, "That's for the unprovoked attack. You're not allowed to say those words to me, you hear?"_

"_Unprovoked attack?" I echoed, turning to face her directly with a smirk. "That was the beginning of Round Two," I challenged, staring into her eyes with my mysterious milky-white ones, reinforced with od._

"_I wish I could see what you could see right now," her voice rich with envy, "I'd have a much better chance of winning Round Two."_

"_Just as long as you don't go below the belt, I think Round Two will be perfectly fair," I promised with a wink, patiently waiting for my sparkling eyes to goad her into attacking._

* * *

><p><strong>July 9, after the early termination of the beach trip due to Silvario Gospel incident.<strong>

"You don't write very much, do you?" Orimura Ichika asked, sitting on his new roommate's bed. He was lying down on his back, pillows bracing his head as he read his roommate's diary. It was relatively early in the morning, and Ichika was still dressed in loose sweats and an undershirt.

"Give me a break," Kail Panganiban pleaded distractedly. Similarly dressed in loose clothes, he pressed a sharp pin into the center of the floor with his heel, muttering something Ichika couldn't hear. He ran a hand through his short hair and stroked his ponytail in frustration. Looking up at the critic with a bemused eye, he continued, "Your diary won't exactly win any National Book Awards anytime soon, either."

"No, I mean literally. How much time did you spend on this, like 5 hours? Also, where's the kanji?" Ichika wondered.

"Probably more, I lost track of time. But seriously, you know how long it takes to learn a new language? I mean, I know how to speak Japanese after being with the real Sever for so long, but I'm learning an entirely new way to write! I don't even have Katakana in there, and don't even think about seeing Kanji in that diary anytime soon. I mean, seriously, who invented this damned writing system! I feel like its the brain child of some dyslexic moron suffering a stroke or something. I want my English!"

"Hey, don't mock our system. We've been using Kana since forever ago, and we came out ok. I mean, look at this!" Ichika flexed his arm, equipping Byakushiki's right arm. The partial summoning of his IS he had been practicing, was a success. "Isn't it the most amazing piece of technology since nuclear power?" He gushed, proudly modeling his country's art for his grumbling roommate.

"Fine, whatever," Kail gave up, tying a piece of chalk to his shoelace, then extending the length by tying another shoelace to the first. He then paced off about 2 meters from the pin, made a mark with the chalk, then affixed the chalk to the mark with duct tape.

"So, what exactly are you trying to do again?" Ichika inquired curiously. "I mean, I helped you make space because you promised to treat me next time we're off campus, but you never explained what this circle is supposed to do. Summoning? Like with our IS?"

"Similar, but do we really have to talk about this now?" Kail griped, focusing on tying the correct length of shoelace to the pin he had driven in earlier. " I did promise to explain everything after class today."

"Hey, I worked damned hard for you, I think I deserve a sneak preview of what I'm about to hear, Ichika argued.

After checking to make sure that the loop around the pin was loose and the chalk line when taught matched the mark he made, Kail stood up to stretch, taking stock of the mess around him. Together, he and Ichika had moved the furniture in the room up against walls and stacked high as possible to clear as big a space they could in their cramped quarters, about 4 meters total. They had even stacked Kail's bed on top of Ichika's in order to make the room Kail needed. Once finished, Ichika had climbed to the top and pulled Kail's diary from under his mattress. With his reluctant permission, Ichika had torn into Kail's memory with a heavy appetite of curiosity.

"Fine, fine, I'm at the easy part anyways. How's the time?" Kail consented.

Looking at the alarm clock on the night stand stacked on the bed with him, Ichika replied, "30 minutes or so. We've got time, unless you're anything like my former roommate. Of course," Ichika pondered out loud, "Charlotte was masquerading as a guy, I'm sure she needed a lot of time to disguise her femininity."

"Have you seen her femininity? I'm sure she had gotten up way earlier than you think to put those melons away," Kail muttered, loud enough for him to hear.

"I'm sorry, did you have a perverted thought about my friend?" Ichika conjectured sinisterly, a veiled threat in his voice.

"Hey, hey," Kail attempted to temper Ichika's protective instinct, "You read my diary, I already have a love."

"True, true...wait, you're distracting me, I read about that already. What's the circle for, and the markings you just made?" Ichika focused on his earlier curiosity.

"You got me." Kail admitted. Carefully stepping over his markings into purposefully made clearings within the circle, he displayed his simple work to Ichika. It was made of two circles, one large one about 4 meters across and the second about 1. Within the ring those circles formed, there were 6+1 crudely and hastily drawn pictures made by the chalk: a European claymore, a classic long bow, a simple lance, an executioner's axe, an animal that looked like some kind of horse, and a vial of poison, only identifiable by the skull and crossbones Kail drew as an afterthought. In the 7th position, with alarming detail and obvious effort, Kail had drawn a magical wand Ichika could have sworn he saw in an old anime he would never admit to have watched. It was a simple pole, but adorned at the top were two beautifully detailed angel wings attached to a ringed start in the middle.

Noticing Ichika's stare, Kail embarrassedly confessed, "Yeah...CCS. I know, it's old and girly, but I just couldn't resist!"

Ichika crawled as close to Kail as possible without upsetting the delicate balance of the double stacked beds, and reached out to Kail's hand. After offering it, Ichika took the boy's hand in his own, and with eyes glistening he whispered, "I know...It was such a good show!"

Releasing his hand, Ichika retreated back to his original position to stabilize the stack of beds. Faking a cough to dismiss his show of sensitivity, Ichika prodded, "So, the 7 pictures you drew. They aren't exactly the godai (five elements), are they?"

"No, actually they should be the classes of the Servant I can obtain for the Holy Grail War."

"Servant?" Ichika interrupted after hearing that unusual word.

"I'd rather explain that later, the mechanics of the War itself are kinda hard to explain. In fact, I'm not even too sure about certain facets of it myself. All I know is that it'll happen in this world, and sometime soon."

"Well, if that's all you know, then why are you so sure this will work?" Ichika pointed out.

"Honestly, I don't know. Hell, I don't even think I'm doing it right. But here's the thing about magic: at its most elementary it exists to grant one's desires. You can literally force a miracle to happen by forcing enough mana into a magic circle for the law of nature to bend around your wish. Spells just make it easy to gauge how much mana I need to use for a pre-specified outcome. In this case, even though the spell itself may be incorrect, if I force enough of my od and feed enough prana into it, I should still have a successful summon."

"Od? Prana? Mana?" The words swirled past Ichika's level of understanding.

"Hey, you really don't need to understand everything I'm telling you. Basically, if I summon someone, the war is on and we'll have hell on our hands. That's what I'm doing and why I was so insistent on doing this so early in the morning." Kail spread his arms wide in an effort to appeal to Ichika's simplicity. Ichika had always been one to learn by doing, even though he had an acceptable aptitude for understanding basic science theory. However, these complicated terms that had nothing to do with physics as he knew it made Ichika dizzy. Helplessly silent, he nodded his assent for Kail to proceed unabated.

Kail stood in the center of the circle, closing his eyes in concentration. Ichika watched as the lines of chalk glowed white-hot, no scientific phenomenon he knew of able to explain what he was witnessing. A flash of color caught Ichika's eye: Kail's right arm glowed with a dark violet energy, inscribing lines down his arm like a circuit board. The purple light illuminated the crest on his right hand, welded to his skin. For as long as Ichika could remember, even the original Sever had black fingerless gloves with that emblem on it. Thinking it was just an accessory, he realized that the reason Sever had the gloves was because she wanted to camouflage her injury. But what could have occurred for that injury to even happen?

A crackle of energy quickly brought Ichika's attention back to Kail's summoning. A switch in Kail's arm audibly clicked, sending a surge of violet light into the circle below him. The dark violet merged with the white of the circle, creating a humble lavender that mesmerized Ichika. He crept forward in fascination, forgetting that the beds he was on were precariously balanced. The beds creaked ominously, threatening to topple at the slightest provocation.

Kail muttered something under his breath, then as if in a trance, began his incantation in English:

I, who call to you beyond the gates of legend,

demand you answer my call, and pledge your life to me.

I, who call to you beyond the gates of legend,

will take your greatest desire and sheathe them with my heart.

I, who call to you beyond the gates of legend,

swear an oath of loyalty to the one whom answers my plea.

I, who call to you beyond the gates of legend,

summon to my side the great wind of victory!

May the bells of war resound as we fulfill our wishes!

With that last line, he stomped the pin completely into the ground. Instantly, the circle turned blood red and engulfed both the chalk and Kail himself in fire.

Ichika watched the magical show, enraptured by the dancing flames. At least, until a small ember touched the sheets of the bedspread, setting them aflame. These magical flames burned through the lower bed as if it were vapor, sending Ichika toppling into the circle. He braced himself for both the pain of heavy burning and the impact with the ground, but to his surprise neither came. The fires danced, but rather than searing his skin off, they playfully licked his skin with warm tendrils of flame. Instead of the awkward crash, he felt a pair of arms pull him into an embrace, protecting him from the brunt of the crash. Instantly, the flames died, revealing scorch marks where Kail's circle was, as well as the remains of the bottom bed. The top had flipped over, creating a triangular shelter above the pair with its headboard as a prop. The sheets on the bed had fallen on top of them, coincidentally leaving their heads exposed.

Ichika found himself nestled into Kail's bare chest, his arms wrapped protectively around his head making sure he didn't land improperly and break his neck. Kail's chest was tight and corded for a man with a slim build. It reminded Ichika of world class runners, except puberty had given Kail a body more suited for strength as he judged by his broad shoulders. Except for the side fat, evidence that the boy hadn't been exercising as frequently as his build would suggest. It reminded Ichika of his own puberty change, his body seeming to refuse to build muscle as his body opted for speed. Ichika spent a good amount of time every day to build up the required muscle needed for his style of kendo. Ichika sharply inhaled, a smell of fire filling his nostrils and making him choke. Their long legs had tangled in the the crash, wrapping around each other like electronic cords from the back of a display.

Ichika looked into the face of his cushion, Kail now wearing a groggy expression of combined worry and relief. His short hair smoked slightly but had no singes, his ponytail wrapped around his neck like a loose noose. Ichika relaxed slightly, realizing that Kail's true face had shown for just a minute: he had abandoned the summoning in order to protect Ichika. Ever since he first met him, Ichika had judged Kail to be the type of character who only thought of himself, especially after the callous way he had first treated Ichika and his group when they rescued him. Right there and then, Ichika made a secret promise to help Kail achieve his goal. But then again what did he come here to accomplish?

Before he got knocked unconscious back in Hawaii, Kail had mentioned he was here in Ichika's world to fight a war. But wouldn't that mean Kail was ready to kill people? Ichika flashed back to his first ever casualty, the helicopter of Phantom Task agents he and his teammate accidentally decimated with an experiment combo attack. They had scaled down the power a bit by altering their timing, but Ichika still felt a deep-seated regret for his impulsive action.

This regret quickly evolved into a feeling of foreboding and danger to his social life as he heard familiar footsteps thunder to his room. Ichika nudged Kail, who was still dizzy from the impact. Kail opened one eye and nodded once, seemingly understanding Ichika's worry. Ichika attempted to extricate himself from his position, but Kail, acting on instinct, wrapped his higher arm tighter around Ichika. Realizing that Kail wasn't thinking straight and that he was stronger than Ichika without his IS, Ichika began to panic as the people behind his door jostled it up, giving them enough slack to worm something through the crack to manually push down the lever. It was a weak point in his door that he knew about, but never got around to requesting it repaired due to daily training usually exhausting him to the point of barely being coherent enough to do homework. Kail grunted, drawing Ichika's attention back to him. Ichika wormed his head around to watch as Kail laid the other hand flat on the ground and muttered, "Trace on."

Ichika watched as a grid covered the entirety of the room for an instant. Immediately, the burned area of the floor returned to its normal color and the damaged bed repaired itself completely, although the top bed remained protectively over them.

Ichika stared at Kail in wonder, marveling at the instantaneous repair of their room. However, he forgot that there were people outside breaking in to see what was the matter.

* * *

><p>When Shinonono Houki of Japan heard the crash, she immediately finished buttoning her blouse, not even bothering to tie her trademark hairband behind her, then rushed to Ichika's room. Her woman's intuition had informed her that her crush was involved in yet another predicament, and that her assistance might be required. Along the way, she met up with Charlotte Dunois of France. She secretly resented the girl for stealing her roommate back when she was Charles, and secretly rejoiced when her voluntary dismissal of the alter ego forced her to move out. However, she bit her lip in irritation as she realized that Charlotte's intuition had also alerted her to Ichika's danger. She frowned harder when they were met at the door by the Gossip trio: consisting of Nohotoke Honne and two other girls Houki had never bothered to learn the names of. In fact, the only reason she knew Honne's name was because she was ranked high in the battle listings along with her partner after the Inter-Class Doubles Tournament.<p>

With a wary eye on the trio, Houki and Charlotte began the secret art of unlocking Orimura's door, obstructing the trio's view with their bodies. This was a secret they shared with only a select group of people. With Houki holding up the door for slack, Charlotte partially summoned her IS and stock a long, delicate probe at the tip of her index finger and pushed in the level. They flung open the door, to be greeted with such a sight that caused the trio behind them to scream. Charlotte reacted with opened-mouthed shock, her face threatening to go from angelic to demonic at the slightest provocation. As for Houki, in the highest pitched voice she could muster, she screeched out one word: "ICHIKA!"

There on the floor of a chaotically messed up room under the shelter of an overturned bed laid Ichika gazing up in wonder at the face of Sever Panganiban, who embraced him with one arm tightly. At the sound of her voice, Ichika straightened up with fear, and struggled valiantly to escape Sever's arm strength, but to no avail. Desperately, he partially summoned his IS, equipping both arms. The added volume pried him out of Sever's wrap, and he rolled out of the sheets from under the shelter. This caused Charlotte to screech in her own high-pitched voice, "ICHIKA, CLOTHES!"

Ichika turned beet red and covered his butt (which happened to be facing the five ladies) with his two gigantic arms, realizing that the earlier flames had painlessly burned away his wardrobe. He scooted behind the bed to open a drawer and quickly put on boxers. For his part, Sever groggily rose from his position, accidentally hitting his head on the bed above him.

"Damn, that was a wild ride," he muttered, the sheet just barely covering up his interesting parts. "How you holding up, Ichika? No broken bones? How's your neck?"

Then he said the words that made Ichika temporarily wish for the only death he ever wished upon anyone: "Damn, my rear hurts. I think that the thing was still slightly erect when I fell on it."

At these words, Honne attempted to push her way into the room over Charlotte and Houki, but was denied access by the half summoned forms of Houki's Aka Tsubaki and Charlotte's Raphael Revive II Custom. She flailed her long sleeves at the two girls, venting her frustrations at the two girls in futility.

Sleepily pushing aside the overturned bed, Sever slowly attempted to stand up. Out of the corner of his eye, Ichika realized that Sever was probably also in the same situation as him and dove towards Sever, his foot accidentally smashing the remote control to one of the displays in the room.

"PAAAOOON!" the sound of an elephant loudly echoed throughout the room from the documentary on Africa that just happened to be on air at the time.

Houki, with blood spurting from her nose, fainted, the weight of her partially summoned IS causing the five girls to crash backwards onto the floor. Pinned by Houki's unconscious and weighted form, the trio struggled to get into a favorable position, Charlotte helpless to impede them due to her own bulky IS partial summoning.

Unfortunately for the Gossip trio, Ichika had succeeded in wrapping the sheet around the still disoriented Sever. Now equipped with a make shift toga, Sever followed Ichika's order to dress properly while Ichika shooed out the girls. Houki and Charlotte made sure to give Ichika one last sour look. Ichika returned it with a look that screamed with panic "It's a misunderstanding!" before closing the door.

The Gossip trio ran as quickly as possible as they could to the elevators, eager to spread the news of what they just witnessed. Meanwhile, Houki and Charlotte shared a look of irritated resignation between them, Houki recently recovered from her fainting.

"Aah," Charlotte groaned, "Not another one. Not only that, but who would've guessed that Sever was actually a boy!" She puffed up her cheeks and balled her fists in front of her as a show of determination to Houki, a girl she recognized as just one of her rivals in love. "I'm going to be a lot more assertive!" She stomped off to the elevators herself, before realizing she hadn't but her blouse on yet and embarrassingly rushing back to her room, doing the dainty run with her hands up in the air and on the balls of her toes.

"I wonder if Ichika likes that kind of ditzy girl," Houki wondered to herself. She got up, posed in the position she saw Charlotte in, and ran back to her room. She once again attempted the pose, hoping it would be to Ichika's tastes. She gave her clothes a once over. Luckily her blood hadn't dirtied them, but she was still in danger as a dropped threatened to fall down. Catching it with a napkin, she held her nose until the bleeding had stopped. The Japanese girl tied the hairband she had forgotten around her long hair, not bothering to twirl it into a ponytail like Charlotte and Kail did. Her hair naturally parted down the middle, flowing past her waist. Now actually ready, she resumed her dainty run back to Ichika's room. Unfortunately, Sever chose that exact moment to step outside the room (luckily fully dressed in a uniform very similar to Ichika's and wearing his fingerless gloves), and Houki daintily crashed into the still dazed Sever.

Sever slumped to the floor while Houki quickly recovered and mounted Sever. She dragged him to her eye level by his ponytail, its girth the only thing keeping it from detaching itself from Sever's scalp.

"You saw nothing," she warned him in a low whisper. At such a close proximity, Houki could smell the smoke of fire from Sever's hair and she wondered what kind of shampoo he used to get that kind of Earthy smell.

In response to her whispered threat, Sever moaned confusedly, "paaaooon~~~". Houki's face immediately colored red at that reminder of this morning. Panicking, she dropped an elbow into Sever's gut, rewarded with a painful grunt from Sever. She ran normally to the elevators, face red with shame.

* * *

><p>Ichika emerged from the room, confusingly staring at a grounded Kail groaning in pain.<p>

"Hey, Ichika," he ground out a pained whisper, "Do...we have miniature tyrannosaurs enrolled in campus?"

"...No..." he cautiously informed him. "Are...you sure you saw a tyrannosaur?"

"It...elbow dropped me," Kail reported back incredulously. "It had a ribbon tied to it's tail, then it went up the elevators," he pointed up the hallway.

"Alright, let's get you to the infirmary real quick before we head to class," Ichika hoisted the weakened Kail onto his shoulder and carry-dragged him to the elevators. The gaggle of woman waiting for the elevators to return part like the Red Sea once they saw the serious look on Ichika's face. He boarded the next elevator alone with his load, and took Kail up to the infirmary on the top floor of the academy. The doctor on duty examined and told Ichika that he had simply lost his breath, and for some reason was having trouble recovering it. He just needed some more time than most people.

As the doctor predicted, Kail had mostly recovered by the time they reached their classroom, able to walk almost completely on his own using Ichika's shoulder as support. With minutes left before the class officially started, Ichika and Kail staggered into the room. Immediately the room erupted into hushed whispers. Ichika walked Kail to his desk in the back of the room, then returned to his own desk enduring the many whispers that flared his cheeks with red.

"Why are Panganiban and Orimura together?"

"Didn't you hear? Apparently they were caught. Together."

"They got in trouble? I knew Sever-san was a delinquent, but to drag down Ichika with her? It's so cruel!"

"Her? You're out of the loop! Actually, Sever-san's actually Sever-kun."

"Ohmygod! Just like Dunois-San?"

"Yeah, but opposite."

"Does this mean he sneaked into IS Academy? Wait, then that means he can use an IS as well! He's the second boy to use an IS! We have another option!" A girl exclaimed excitingly. The thought of being able to go after another guy spread like wildfire, but it was doused with a simple statement from what Ichika thought would be the most unlikely, if not impossible, sources.

"Well..." a familiarly kind voice drawled, laced with venom only Ichika could hear. HE slowly turned his head around, beads of sweat forming on his brow as he watched the face of his angel of kindness Charlotte transform into the face of the angel of death. As if all his awareness was concentrated on her full lips, Ichika turned his full attention to the next words out of her mouth.

"They were embracing each other...naked..."

The room erupted in a squeal that shook Kail from his dazedness. Ichika watched in sick satisfaction as the events of this morning were made clear to Kail, his face darkening with greater and greater horror as he realized exactly what his careless words have implicated for the two of them.

"Naked? Really?"

"Yeah, yeah! I was there! And get this: I heard Sever say 'my rear hurts. I think that the thing was still slightly erect when I fell on it." Ichika and Kail blushed hard at this gossip, eliciting a squeal that threatened to shatter the plate glass windows of the classroom. In the midst of this, Ichika could hear a girl cry out, "Ohmygod! It's just like my books! It's a dream come true!"

That was the last straw. Ichika did not and would not want to know what was in her books nor her dreams. It seemed Kail had the same sentiment, as they simultaneously both stood up straight, slapped their hands on their desks and shouted, "I like women!"

The door at the front of the class slipped open and a stern voice called from outside, "That's great, now sit your asses down, you brats!"

At the authoritative tone of her voice, Kail and Ichika sat back down while the class quickly eliminated all traces of yaoi fantasy from their faces.

With an aura of control, their instructor Orimura Chifuyu, who also happened to be Ichika's sister, entered the room, followed by the smiling deputy instructor Yamada Maya. Ichika smirked at the plate above that door which read "Donated by the Huang Family". Orimura-sensei started off the class by announcing, "First off, welcome back to school. I do apologize for terminating the beach class early, however, circumstances beyond our control forced our hand.

"Secondly, I'd like to address the Silvario Gospel mission." A hushed whisper immediately emerged from the class.

"As you know," Orimura-sensei continued, unaffected by the gossip, "the mission was supposed to be a secret. However," she eyed the Gossip trio who happened to be in the class, "an anonymous someone seems to have spread the news. I would like to clarify that yes, we recovered the IS and are examining it. Under the Alaska Pact, we are allowed to do research on it without making it accessible to the public. Now that we are aware of this leak," again glancing in the trio's direction, "we will be more careful in maintaining OUR SECRECY." This time, she glared at the trio, a silent threat that the class knew she would make good on if necessary. Chills ran up Ichika's spine as he remembered that the last time Orimura got angry she had vaporized her antagonist into elementary particles. Of course, the antagonist was a robot, but knowing her, Ichika felt like she wouldn't hesitate even if her opponent were human and she were sufficiently irritated.

"As a result of this, the entire first year will be sanctioned for the entire duration of Christmas vacation."

A great cry of rebellion erupted from the class, quickly silenced by Orimura-sensei's twitching eye. "Not to worry," she emphasized the beginning of her sentence, "we here at the Academy realize that your few short weeks of vacation are the only times you can fully relax and have enough time to see your families scattered all over the world. Not only that, but we do owe you for cutting the beach trip short. Therefore, we will allow you to have December 23, 24 and 25 off, Friday through Sunday. You have half a year to change your plans and learn the penalty for violating an order of confidentiality."

Ichika turned in his seat as he felt the air turn sour. The rest of the girls, especially the ones from foreign countries, glared at the Gossip trio. Honne and her friends seemed to shrink in their seats in shame.

Faking a cough, Orimura-sensei regained the attention of the class. "Finally, I'd like to announce a roster change. Yamada-sensei, if you will."

Yamada-sensei stepped up next to Orimura-sensei and began speaking in a clearly uncomfortable voice. "As I'm sure you're heard," Yamada-sensei began, flushing slightly after referring to the gossip Orimura had quelled with her presence, "One of us has updated...their information," the euphemism having difficulty coming out of her lips. "Sever-kun, if you would."

Ichika watched Kail enter through the doors at the front. He wheeled back in his seat, along with 20 other heads, and stared at Kail's now empty seat. Somehow, he had taken the opportunity to escape out the back without the rest of the class knowing. In hindsight, he realized that the original Sever had done the exact same thing. Even though he claimed they were entirely different people, he smiled at the thought that there were still some similarities between them, even if it was as simple as taking advantage of a distraction.

"Good morning, I'm Sever Panganiban from America," Kail introduced himself. "On paper, I'm Natalia Fairs' half-sister, but as you can see I no longer have the luxury of that identity. I do apologize for the deception and hope to continue the class like before."

Fat chance of that, Ichika thought. After this disaster, I don't think our lives will ever be back to normal, as he palmed his head in pain.

Yamada continued by saying, "As you can see, Sever-kun is really a man. This also means that he is the second male to be able to move an IS. I would like to mention that just like with Dunois-san, the Academy had full knowledge of his true gender. As such, he had been given a personal IS for the sake of classified research that our superiors have seen fit to release. However, this is an Academy secret: I would like to remind all of you that breaching this confidentiality will not only result in expulsion but we will be forced to charge you with terrorism under the Alaska Pact."

Ichika let out a low whistle as the girls conversed between themselves in low whispers, this was the first he had heard of the Academy even exercising its right to secrecy under the Alaska Pact, much less releasing information. Even the Silvario Gospel incident was made public, although the details were still yet to be released. Not only that, but the Academy actively threatened to take action against this. He realized that her warning to the Gossip trio was just her way of making sure that they didn't violate this upcoming rule. He watched her keep a wary eye on the three girls, who tried to cower even lower in their seats.

"Alright, now that announcements are done, we have practicals with class 2. Meet me at the stadium in 30 minutes," Orimura-sensei ordered as she left through the door, Yamada following closely behind. Almost immediately, Ichika left the classroom in order to avoid peeping on the girls, dragging Kail by the collar.

"Hey! Let me go! I wasn't going to peep, dammit!" Kail protested. Indeed, Ichika had preempted Kail's own exit, and so he gave Kail the benefit of the doubt and released him.

He immediately stalled his pace and craned his neck to get a full second's view of Class 2, whom Ichika expected to also be in the midst of changing. With a sigh, he grabbed Kail's ponytail of jet black hair and tugged hard. Off balance, Kail struggled to both catch up to Ichika's now accelerated pace and to somehow regain his balance, complaining all the way.

Once they reached the stadium's locker room, Ichika growled out, "Hey, don't you have a lover or something? What would she say if she caught you perving on other girls?"

With a look of exaggerated mortification, Kail explained, "Look man, we just got mistaken for yaoi guys. I had to do something to preserved my heterosexuality. Did you see the looks on their faces? Seriously, they were already blushing from the gossip earlier, but did you see the smile on their faces as you dragged me away?"

He shuddered as if a cold wind had passed through the climate-controlled room.

"I shudder to imagine what kind of things they're talking about in there," he lamented.

"Well, good thing you're in here instead of out there," Ichika said while stripping out of his uniform. He had never been the type to be worried about gossip, especially in a school of gossip-loving girls. From a locker marked "Orimura", he pulled out his IS suit: a two piece affair consisting of a skin-tight black shirt that bared his midriff and tight fitting pants with a relief for his...masculinity he felt was best to describe it. He made a quick inspection of his looks, tucking in his masculinity so that it wouldn't be apparent once outside.

Kail headed over to a locker marked "Panganiban" and opened it while stripping out of his uniform. He stared at the article of clothing within and hailed Ichika.

"Hey, do you think Orimura-sensei ever got around to submitting the information change last night?"

"Well, Yamada-sensei did introduce you as a man formally, so I guess it happened. After all, the only people who should know that you're actually not the real Sever is Chifuyu-nee, you, and me. Everyone else sees you as Sever."

"Huh. Is that why you always call me by my real name rather than 'Sever'?" He pointed out.

Ichika nodded once, "Right. In public I'll use that name..." he trailed off, clearly uncomfortable to use address Kail as his pseudonym, but recovered quickly, "but I'll always call you Kail in private."

"Works for me," Kail shrugged, looking dejectedly inside his...no, Sever's locker.

"So, what exactly are you looking at to make you look so miserable?" Ichika peeked into the open locker, openly bursting into a fit of laughter as he saw the clothing within. Similar to Ichika's outfit, it was a skintight outfit, however this was made of one piece. With a grumble, Kail set it down on the floor, then stepped into what served as leg holes. He cautiously pulled it up, the fabric that served as the bottom delicately crushing his...masculinity in ways Ichika could only understand by looking at his face. Through pain and perseverance, Kail eventually wormed his way into the navy blue IS outfit, one that resembled a girl's school swimsuit completely with stockings.

Ichika struggled to keep from guffawing, feeling pity for the boy as he turned around and inspected his own looks.

"Well, this is quite uncomfortable," Kail commented in a high-pitched deadpan, one that triggered a torrent of open laughter from Ichika. However, what sent to Ichika the floor rolling with mirth was the fact that Kail took two fingers, bent painfully down slowly, and stretched out the fabric that had clumped in his butt crack.

Ichika rolled on the floor for a good minute, eyes closed in helpless joy as he wallowed in the schadenfreude. Kail rested his hands against Ichika's torso and waist in order to keep him from colliding with anything in the small space between lockers. At the end of his laughing fit, Ichika finally opened his eyes, then widened them in astonishment. Kail was now wearing a similar pair of pants curiously the same color as the swimsuit he forced himself into, although he had no shirt.

Noticing Ichika's stare, Kail shrugged, "It was the best I could do with the material." He held out a clump of material in his left hand, the remains of the IS pilot suit he had somehow altered during Ichika's brief minute of laughter. He switched hands, offering his free hand to help Ichika off the floor.

Leading the way to the stadium grounds, Kail slowly strode through the hallways, Ichika a half-pace behind and pestering him with curious questions that echoed throughout the small hallway.

"How did you alter that so fast?"

"Well, magic...no, I really should call it magecraft."

"Magecraft?"

"I keep throwing out weird terminology out at you, huh?" Kail realized. "Well, basically magecraft is magic that can be replicated by science." He held out the clump of cloth in his hand and muttered, "Trace on."

Immediately, the clump of cloth disassembled itself into a tangled weave of thread. Ichika couldn't tell where one thread began and the others ended. Kail compressed the mess in his hand, hiding it from Ichika's view. With another muttering, he opened his hand and a neatly wound spool of thread appeared.

"Here," Kail offered the end to Ichika. "Take this and keep walking."

Ichika looped the thread around his finger, the thread feeling slightly waxy like his waterproof IS suit. He maintained his pace while Kail stopped dead in his tracks, the spool spinning on his thumb like a spindle. Ichika pivoted and walked backwards to stare in amazement as the thread unspooled, clearing 100 meters easily before Kail caught the other end and tugged hard. Ichika froze in shock as the thread pulled him forward (backwards relative to his momentum). A thread of that size should have broke rather than pull on him with that much force.

Kail followed shortly, winding the thread on his arm tautly.

"What did you do exactly?"

"Well, that was a little demonstration of my abilities as a mage. Basically, I showed you my two best techniques: Alteration and Augmentation."

Ichika opened his mouth to ask a question, but Kail cut him off with a finger. They walked out into the open air of the stadium grounds, where Orimura-sensei was waiting for them.

"The both of you are early," Orimura-sensei commended them. "Kail, how did the diary writing go? Ichika's prompts help you any?"

"Horrible," Ichika answered for Kail. "He spent 5 hours or so writing about 1 or 2 pages of Hiragana."

"Sorry," Kail grumbled, "I just happen to come from another world. Sorry if my writing language is unrecognizable. You should be happy I can at least speak the language even if I can't write it."

"I figured this would happen," Orimura-sensei stated. "You need to learn how to write in Japanese in order to remain in our protection. If you were to be expelled due to low grades, I have it on good authority that America would love to get its hands on you and figure out exactly why only you and Ichika can pilot IS. In fact, if I didn't get Ichika enrolled here so quickly, Japan would have taken him to perform God-knows-what kind of experiments on him."

Ichika looked at his sister with a look of gratitude. "Really?" he asked, "I didn't realize that why you got me here so fast. I'm touched."

For a second, Orimura-sensei's face softened for just a second, before she adopted her stern face again. "Ahem," she cleared her throat in an effort to disguise her momentary sensitivity, "well, once you graduate you will officially be recognized as IS pilots and as such will be exempt from loyalty to any one country. Therefore, you will be able to protect yourself both physically and legally."

"Right, Chifuyu-nee," Ichika agreed.

Orimura-sensei brought down a heavy-handed chop onto the soft of Ichika's head. He slumped to the ground in pain while Orimura-sensei admonished him, "Call me Orimura-sensei at school."

Turning to Kail, she changed the subject, "And what about you? How is your IS? Were you ever able to remove it?"

Kail displayed the crest on his right hand, now wearing a fingerless glove with a cut out for it. Ichika recognized it as the same accessory Sever wore before Kail took over. The glove looked brand new, but the crest in the middle was tarnished and slightly burned to the point of not being able to recognize the kanji written on it. He removed the glove, showing Orimura-sensei the seam in his skin created by the welded emblem.

"I can't seem to remove it, at least not painlessly. Not only that, but I can't summon the actual Deep Purple. I can still summon copied parts, but I don't know if I can actually use them," he replied.

"Copied parts?" Ichika interrupted. "What's this about?"

"One of Kail's IS abilities. We'll show you in a bit," Orimura-sensei flashed a conspicuously malevolent look at Kail, who shivered at the sight.

* * *

><p>Huang Ling Yin, Rin to her friends, led her class out to the Stadium grounds as class rep. Along the way, they were joined by class one, led by Cecilia Alcott. In the beginning of the year, she had competed with Ichika for the title of class rep, but when she won she deferred it to Ichika. However, as both a personal IS user as well as a person considered the most mature, she still commanded a great deal of leadership for her class. With Ichika being forced to leave for training, Cecilia wound up a sort of vice-class rep, fulfilling Ichika's duties as class rep with a smile on her face. Rin had developed both a friendship and a rivalry with this girl, jealous of her ability to work without complaint for the person she liked, but also admiring that same ability. Rin felt like if she could just achieve the level of humility Cecilia had, then her own crush might take notice. Rin used her both as her model as well as her scratching post, but the two shared a deep friendship.<p>

They were so similar, that the two exuded the same aura of darkness after Cecilia relayed the gossip she heard earlier to Rin. Including the part about them being together naked. Just as her teacher had done when Charlotte revealed her true gender, it was similarly announced Sever was actually a boy. But even without that fact, the thought of Ichika losing his chastity to someone like Sever was unacceptable to the two of them. Almost not conscious of her own actions, she found both she and Cecilia walking in sync at an accelerated pace through the campus. Together in foreboding harmony, the two girls muttered, "Kill Sever, Kill Sever, Kill Sever." They didn't notice that the girls following them had purposefully slowed their gait, attempting to get as much space from the two girls as possible.

Once they reached the stadium, they saw Ichika, Orimura-sensei, and Sever speaking cordially before Sever started shivering uncontrollably. Rin imagined a dark tendril of darkness wrapping itself around him and draining his warmth, and she chuckled a hollow laugh which was echoed by Cecilia. Cecilia's hands clenched and unclenched, the actions forcing blood into her pale hands and making them a furious pink. Yamada-sensei from Class 1 had also joined the group, carrying a large bag.

"Good timing. Huang, Alcott, Orimura, Panganiban, front and center! Everyone else, form up in ranks and files, 5 across!" Orimura-sensei directed. As the students hastily scrambled to follow orders, Rin noticed Sever hang back a bit before falling into line, scouring the girls behind them. With a disappointed look that Rin saw Orimura-sensei catch, Sever fell last into formation in the free spot Ichika left him at the end.

"Today, we will be practicing battles using partial summonings. Orimura, Huang, demonstration."

"Yes, ma'am," they chorused in unison. "Byakushiki, limited mode!" Ichika called out while Rin simply concentrated on the arms of her IS. In an instant, the white right arm of Byakushiki and both arms of Rin's IS Shenlong materialized out of xtradimensional space. Xtradimensional space was a relatively new concept that had been de-fictionalized out of many anime, and therefore jokingly called "hammer-space". In reality, most of the IS itself existed in a pocket of space beyond the third dimension, a small part staying with the pilot. These parts, known as the IS's standby form, ranged in shape and size, from the armband on Ichika's forearm, to Cecilia's earring, to Sever's emblem, to Rin's bracelet. The important part was that a piece still existed in their perceptive reality and could serve as a tether for the rest of it. When called through the dimensional barrier, the act was known as summoning an IS. Incidentally, the BUS slots used to store IS equipment worked the same exact way, except due to power limitations, certain equipment would require more BUS slots.

"Now, sometimes you may find yourself in a situation where it just isn't feasible to summon your IS fully," Orimura-sensei began her lecture. With this cue, Yamada pushed a button on a little device from inside her bag and a pale red shield appeared inches above the students heads. Gazing in awe at this newly introduced function of the stadium shields, the students distractedly observed the shield. One girl had even attempted to push on it, finding it to be just as hard as pushing through the arena shields that protected the audience from harm.

"For example, there may be a low ceiling." The shield disappeared, then was replaced by a pale green shield that separated the ranks. Just like before, the students found the tactile feedback of the green shield to be just as resilient.

"Or there may be narrow corridors." The shield disappeared, and the students returned their attention to the lecturer.

"There could even be other conditions that would require the use of partial summoning, however the decision to which type of combat would suit you better is your responsibility. Yamada-sensei, the devices, please."

Yamada-sensei pulled out devices that resembled a four point harness, but with a color coded gauge on the buckle reading green at the top, red on the bottom, and two in between shades in the middle.

"These devices allow us to practice partial summoning battles with AD, the shield that prevents most, if not all, of the damage of a direct attack. It is important to remember that if you choose to battle with partial summoned parts, the only body parts that will be protected by AD are the ones you equip. Fully equipped IS spread the AD over the torso and head. These devices will protect your entire body with AD as if you were fully equipped for 5 minutes max. They will connect to your IS once we begin and you can gauge its level with the marker on the buckle." She pointed out that the gauge on the front was also on the top; a quick look down would tell them an approximate amount left.

"Right now we will hold demonstration of three things: partial summoning fights, and a formal introduction of the two boys' IS," Orimura-sensei explained. The girls erupted in a cheer, they had heard of Ichika's 2nd shift, but they haven't seen it. Even more interesting was the IS Sever apparently had, a well-kept secret that no one had an idea about.

"We will simulate battles in a 'narrow corridor' using the shields. The object of this battle is not to win or lose, but to gain experience that will be helpful in assisting your classmates. Are we understood?"

The four nodded their heads simultaneously, but only a sharp eye would notice the evil grin spreading on the two girls' faces. Not only would they get some 1-on-1 time with Ichika, but they would have full reign to bring the hurt on Sever, the perverted thief who stole Ichika's purity.

"Right then, Orimura, Panganiban you're up first."

* * *

><p>Ichika and Kail walked up to Orimura-sensei, who attached the device to their chest by hanging it from their necks and joining the two bottom pieces tautly around their pecs. They found the device had enough slack in order for them to move around comfortably, so they waited for their next instructions. Orimura-sensei pointed to two marks on the ground, apparently projected from the observation tower. As the two boys took their marks, about 50 meters away, the pale red ceiling and the green walls appeared. With the ground, they formed a rectangular prism about 2 meters high and 2 meters wide.<p>

"Sever, if you would, please summon Byakushiki," Orimura-sensei requested.

Byakushiki? There was only one in the world and Ichika was using it. How could Kail use it? Behind them, the entire class caused an uproar of confused murmurs.

Apparently, Kail was confused, too. He stared at the emblem on his right fist, and started talking to it, "Look, you heard the woman. Let me summon, even just an arm. What? Hey, I tried to look for her, I'll get answers after class, ok?"

He was...negotiating with the IS? And who is this "her"? Apparently his IS relented, most likely reluctantly, because the IS's right arm took a long time to emerge from what Ichika could only describe as an "unforgiving, cold" light. It didn't make sense, but the light that his IS emitted seemed to have been filled with sadness and regret. It reminded him of his own big mistake, the accidental killing of 20 men due to Ichika and Houki's overzealous attack.

He needed to get stronger and wiser, so that similar events wouldn't happen again.

He gasped in surprise, a reaction shared by the girls behind them, as he recognized the form of Sever's IS arm: it had the exact same form as Byakushiki's 1st shift. It was a gauntlet that covered the arm, a simple design without a lot of weight. Ichika's own arm, the evolved version of Kail's current one, was a great deal beefier with spikes on its knuckles.

"Are you two ready?" Orimura-sensei asked. Ichika nodded, taking a fighting stance. In this limited space, using the Yukihira would probably put him at an disadvantage due to the low ceiling. He had some confidence in his brawling capabilities, but he never tried fighting with a single arm before. He queued a request to summon the other arm for at least balance in both range and power. In addition, he would also gain the particle cannon which would easily defeat Kail in this narrow corridor, but Ichika didn't want to escalate the battle unless he had to. He couldn't bare to have another accident due to an untested or underestimated attack.

Kail hesitated a bit longer, eventually deciding on a loose stance that encouraged mobility, his armored hand extended and flexing. Ichika shook his head in doubt, there was barely enough room to move. The most optimal strategy should be either a retreat and fire for long range types, or a direct charge for melee types. Ichika smiled a bitter smile, realizing he was eager to see what kind of fight Kail could bring. The blood pumping in his veins, Ichika shot off like a rocket, charging directly at Kail. Ichika messed with the stride of his steps, causing an odd rhythm in his footfalls as well as an unpredictable timing for Kail to counter. With these controlled infrequencies, Ichika was sure that even if Kail evaded the attack, he would have no time to react, giving Ichika a second shot.

He stepped within range, his right foot forward and his body twisted to through a punch with all his weight behind it. As he predicted, Kail wasn't able to get the timing right for a counter, only able to get his hand up in time. Ichika prepared himself for the eventual block, but was surprised when instead of guarding or parrying it, Kail grabbed his fist.

The two bled off Ichika's forward momentum by dragging their legs in the ground, both valiantly struggling to stay up right without the use of IS on their legs. Their knees shook and arched in ways that both boys would feel in the morning. However, in the heat of battle their adrenaline masked their pain and their desire to win increased twofold.

Ichika's sensors told him that his arm hit its peak load. Even with the devolved arm, Kail's Byakushiki 1st shift matched Ichika's Byakushiki 2nd shift Newton for Newton in strength. So Ichika resorted to his queued action to unbalance their strength. With a flash of light, he summoned the left arm, equipped with the said particle cannon. He aimed it directly at Kail's face, charging the gun to minimal pressure and hoping Kail would have the sense to defend with his arm. However, the small lapse in concentration allowed Kail to twist his body, gaining more leverage and slamming Ichika to the ground, where he proceeded to mount his torso. With this right hand keeping Ichika's right in check and his legs forcing the particle cannon to face the wall, Kail used his free hand to massage Ichika's neck, signifying the actual attack.

Orimura-sensei gave Ichika the rest of the time to struggle out of Kail's submission hold. Even if Kail's groin was right against his upper arm, his legs were holding Ichika's elbow and shoulder tightly. Ichika couldn't get enough wind up to deliver a significant hit. Every jostle caused Kail a certain degree of pain, but Kail persevered to the time limit, treating the encounter as a life-or-death situation. The light massage turned into a series of fierce gropes, each impact by Ichika causing a tightening around his throat. Once the shield were released, so did Kail's hold, who immediately curled up in the fetal position in order to privately allay his injuries. Ichika rolled over to rest a gentle arm on his shoulder, his knees knocking with fatigue, and apologized to his roommate, "Sorry about that, I couldn't think of any other way to escape. You ok?"

Kail raised his hand high into the air and gave him a thumbs up, but he still squirmed on the ground.

"I'll treat you to lunch afterwards, so relax a bit," Ichika offered, sitting up next to the agonized boy.

* * *

><p>Rin smiled a satisfied grin, one mirrored by Cecilia. She had no idea that Ichika would resort to such an attack, but the outcome was so satisfying she had completely forgotten about the rumors. After all, if it was true they were together, why would he pound on Sever's good parts? She flushed slightly at this thought, before stopping her thought process and imagining the other boy's good parts.<p>

"Huang, Alcott, attention!" Orimura-sensei ordered. Rin quickly sprung to attention. Rin ground her foot on her friend's, who reacted with an angry glare at the short Chinese girl. With her eyes, Rin motioned Cecilia to Orimura-sensei's own darker glare.

"Attention, Alcott," she growled, and Cecilia stood at attention so fast her curly hair straightened. The girls let Orimura-sensei affix the devices to their torsos, Cecilia having a bit of difficulty getting hers put on. Once again, Rin felt the pangs of jealousy as she watched Orimura-sensei attempt to connect the ends behind Cecilia's breasts. With a grunt of exasperation, Orimura-sensei pivoted to have the boys directly behind her. Wondering what was going on, Rin sneaked around to steal a quick peak. With a red blush, she watched as Orimura-sensei guided the two lines into Cecilia's suit and guided to the back, barely enough length to connect. Cecilia moaned with discomfort and embarrassment, the sound vaguely erotic to Rin's ears.

After finishing, Orimura-sensei ordered, "You two are next. Take your marks." Orimura-sensei pointed at the marks, now moved a little bit further from where Ichika and Sever were sitting/lying in pain. As soon as the girls stepped on the marks, the familiar corridor was erected.

"Are you ready?" she asked. Rin responded by summoning her scimitars, dual wielding them with relative ease in the small space. Cecilia, still red from the woman-handling, summoned her Blue Tears UAVs as well as her IS arms and the sniper rifle. Once again, the two were given the chance to prove their strength against each other.

Rin took the first action, charging at Cecilia as fast as her feet could carry her. Similarly, Cecilia started jumping backwards, firing her UAVs which themselves fired annoying bursts of suppressive fire. At the apex of each of her jumps, she shot her sniper rifle. As it was an optical weapon, it had relatively no recoil, but the little recoil it did have extended her jump. Rin blocked each shot of the sniper rifle, not even properly aimed, and endured the torrent of incoming laser fire. Glancing down, Rin saw her AD take a substantial hit after rushing past the optical flak curtain, but she still had energy left. Cecilia attempted to retract her UAVs, but the arc they had to inscribe caused them to smash into the walls and rebound at uncontrollable angles. She dismissed the UAVs, and attempted to parry and evade Rin's swings and smashes. However, Cecilia did not excel at close combat. Her feeble attempts were rebuffed by Rin's skill and strength. Rin's blades scratched against her AD bit by bit.

* * *

><p>Cecilia decided to take a gamble. She dismissed her arms and rifle and fell onto her back, as if she missed her last jump. Rin, seizing the opportunity, jumped into the air to mount her, similarly to what Sever had done. However, Cecilia wanted this to happen. She immediately summoned her legs, kicking out and catching Rin right in the stomach and slamming her against the red ceiling. The shield hummed and sparked, but stayed strong. Cecilia had used herself as a trap and the corridor itself as a weapon. However, Rin's arms were still free, and the length of her IS arms plus that of her scimitars were more than enough to deal heavy damage to Cecilia with each swing. She attempted to guard with her IS arms, but to no avail. Her AD was diminishing at a rapid pace. Finally, the time limit expired, the shields disengaged and Cecilia's constant pressure propelled Rin into the air. With an agile flip, Rin dismissed her IS parts and landed like an acrobat. With a look of displeasure, she walked over to Cecilia and helped her up. Cecilia instantly noticed something was wrong with the girl and challenged her hotly, "What? Are you disappointed in that simple trap? Maybe you should think a little before blindly charging into combat!" She hoped to appeal to the proud fighter within that small physique, but Rin coldly ignored the taunt, stepping back into line. With a frown, Cecilia joined her in rank, followed by Ichika and Sever on still shaky legs.<p>

"Good job, pilots," Orimura-sensei praised them. "As you can see, both Ichika and Sever's IS have very interesting abilities. You've seen both Ichika's new long range option, and Sever's ability to mimic other IS. More information can be found on the database for both IS.

"In addition, you've seen different strategies for partial summoning battles. Rin and Ichika opted for a direct charge, Sever focused on a counter, and Cecilia used her long range weaponry as best she could in that environment.

Ichika and Sever followed Orimura-sensei out of the stadium through the north exit. Yamada-sensei led the rest of the girls out the east, who happily gossiped about the today's lesson and the boy's IS. However, Cecilia's preoccupations distanced her from the mass. She hung back to walk with Rin, who was slow to return with the group.

"What's wrong?" she asked her, face full of genuine worry.

"Nothing!" Rin cried, as she dashed off to the dorms, leaping over brush and cutting through lawns. If she squinted, Cecilia could see drops of tears falling on the path Rin had trail-blazed. She wanted to follow the girl, but her back seemed to scream "Don't follow me!" in a body language only Cecilia could understand.

At a loss for things to do, Cecilia decided to return to her dorm to catch up on some work. Maybe Rin will cool down during the break.

* * *

><p>Finally, the lunch break had arrived. A certain girl returned to her dorm, confident her roommate would be eating lunch about now. "Bewegt," she muttered, and the room's furniture started rearranging themselves. The beds were stacked and pushed to the side, the nightstand and chairs put on top of the table. Within moments, the room had cleared out an area for the girl to mark a 4 meter circle with a piece of chalk with a practiced hand. Within seconds, she had drawn a series of concentric circles a half meter apart in diameter. Within the spaces between circles, she wrote out words of power in a language not in current vernacular. After she had finished, she fished out a tattered cape and placed it over her uniform. Standing slightly off the middle of her circles, she pricked her blood with a glowing red gem she fished from the capes inner pocket. She flung specks of blood around her, not appearing to care what they hit. With her preparation complete, she waited for the time to read 11:59 before starting her perfectly timed chant:<p>

Das Material ist aus Silber und Eisen.

Der Grundstein ist aus Stein und dem Großherzog des Vertrag.

Der Ahn ist mein großer Meister Schweinorg.

Schutz gegen einen heftigen Wind.

Schließ alle Tore, geh aus der Krone, zirkulier die Gabelung nach dem König.

Füll, füll, füll, füll, füll.

Es wird fünfmal wiederholt.

Nur ist es die volle Zeit gebrochen.

Satz.

Du überläßt alles mir, mein Schicksal überläßt alles deinem Schwert.

Das basiert auf dem Gral, antwort wenn du diesem Willen und diesem Vernunftgrund folgst.

Liegt das Gelübde hier.

Ich bin die Güte der ganzen Welt.

Ich bin das Böse der ganzen Welt.

Du bist der Himmel mit dreien Wortseelen.

Komm, aus dem Kreis der Unterdrückung, der Schutzgeist der Balkenwaage!

The clock struck noon as she finished her chant. The drawing glowed a deep black as her arm spilled black light into the circles. The gem in her hand disintegrated into dust, swirling in a vortex of wind and power. The specks of red gem scattered across the drawing, turning the deep black into a rich ebony. From that ebony emerged a humanoid figure made completely of shadow. As the shadow emerged from the ground, the girl felt a painful etching scar across her stomach. She endured the pain until the shadow had fully appeared.

"As per the contract," the gravelly voice announced in Japanese, "I come from the ether to answer the call and fulfill my desires. I ask of you, are you the Master who called me forth?"

The girl opened her mouth to answer, but she was interrupted by her roommate opening the door and exclaiming, "What in the-"

In the blink of an eye, the figure of shadow embraced the newcomer, silencing her immediately. The shadow closed the door and returned to its Master, the girl still caught in its grasp

"I am your Master, and together we will seek the Holy Grail," the Master declared, completely ignoring the frightened but silenced squeaks of her captured roommate. She offered the tattered cape she wore to its original owner. In the shadows hands, the cape seemed to gain new life, becoming shiny and new. The shadow placed the cape where its shoulders would be. Inside the swirling mass of darkness, the captured girl flailed franticly about, but was silenced when two holes, about three-quarters in diameter each, appeared in her neck at her carotid artery. The Master watched as the girl's eyes went dark and her body went limp, the mana being sucked out of her at a rapid pace. The Master watched in sick fascination as the shadow grew heavier and heavier, devouring the girl's body. Using it as a medium, the shadow formed the shape of an adult man of distinctly European origin. The cape expanded over his body. When he unfurled it, he was wearing a noble suit that gleamed with power. Armed with a handsome grin and boyish features, he was well equipped to charm ladies of any age. Except for his Master, who saw him as nothing more than a tool.

"Servant Assassin," the man said with a graceful accent, not at all like the gravelly voice she heard earlier. With a polite bow, he declared, "Ma'am, I feel the bonds of mana linking us together, however I am familiar with the relationship between mages and their familiars. Please prove to me that you are, indeed, a Master."

The girl slowly opened her blazer and undid the bottom of her blouse, exposing the red marks of her Command Seal.

"The contract is complete. From now on, my skills shall be your blade, your life shall become my sheath. Let us obtain the Holy Grail."

He knelt to the ground in humility, humbly awaiting his Master's command.

* * *

><p>Author's Note: God I hate myself. I've been using these things as cries for attention, not what the notes should be used for. No more. Story will just be its story and that's it.<p>

Thanks for putting up with my whiny bitch self. I'll work hard to get over myself and put out my very best.


	3. Ch 2 Corridors and Wars

Chapter 2 – Corridors and Wars

Disclaimer: Infinite Stratos and the Fate universe belong to the original creators. Any use of them is strictly for non-profitable and non-derogatory purposes, covered under the Fair Use Act.

* * *

><p>July 9, during lunch break in the observation tower<p>

"Seriously, are you ok?" Ichika asked for the second time.

"Don't worry too much about it," Kail answered. "I have a high tolerance for pain."

"Unfortunately, simply taking attacks is not a practical way of fighting," Chifuyu pointed out. "Was that your first fight?"

With an embarrassed look aside, Kail uttered a small "yes."

"Wait, but that hold you used was perfect," Ichika exclaimed. "I could barely move after you got me into it."

"Tell that to my crotch," Kail snapped back. He bowed his legs before continuing with a pained sigh, "Tolerance or no tolerance, it still hurts. Anyways, to be perfectly honest, I just kinda reacted. Every time I saw you try to move, I just wrapped a limb around the part that moved."

"You were able to see and react that quickly? Even while fighting?" Chifuyu questioned.

"Yes, I was never really good at battle, I don't even know how to throw a punch. I got teased a lot for that back in my own world."

It was innocent statements like that which reminded Chifuyu about her student's true origins. Though she would never show it on her face, she was troubled by the sudden replacement of her student. As soon as she met Kail, he said that he had "taken her place". After he had knocked out Houki with emotional shock on that mission, Kail proceeded to explain how the original Sever had died. Using their identical genetics as a medium, he quickly took over the vacated body. He called himself a "squatter" implying that he had actually been inside of that body before taking it over, but before he could explain that, Houki had recovered from her fainting and returned Kail's favor. With excessive force.

Coupled with his apparent fatigue, he stayed asleep for the entire time, only waking up as they touched down at the academy. However, by that time the School Director had called them in for an immediate. She and Kail quickly worked out a cover story, which was presented to the class earlier.

"What do you mean by a 'support type'?" Ichika asked, his curiosity interrupting Chifuyu's wandering train of thought. She focused her attention back onto the current conversation, impressively never letting her face show the deviation in her focus.

"It has to do with the 'Alteration' and 'Augmentation' tricks I showed you before," he explained. Turning to her, Kail explained further, "I showed Ichika the magic I use. I can show you a bit later, but right now I'm kinda drained. I don't think I can perform right now. If I get some food, I can recover enough to do a proper demonstration." Both his and Ichika's stomachs agreed with ferocious twin growls.

"That's not necessary," Chifuyu rejected, shooting down Kail's proposal."I need information right now, food can wait. You mentioned when we met, you were going to 'fight a war'. Exactly what do you mean by that?"

The quick rejection was met with disappointed looks on her two pupils' faces. Chifuyu's own stomach threatened its own rebellion, but with great self-control she subdued her traitorous digestive system and focused on Kail.

For his part, Kail struggled to find the words to explain his predicament. Chifuyu figured that the hesitation was due to the same problem he experienced with the writing. Since Kail came from a different world, he had a different language and writing system. He was attempting to learn the writing system, but somehow he already knew how to speak Japanese. He was probably having trouble coming up with words and phrases that accurately described in the new language.

"Well, I guess it's easiest to describe it the way it was described to me," Kail guessed. "Even though I called it a 'War', it might be better described as an epic 'Battle'. The only reason why it's called a war is because when the battle is finished, the country...looks like a war zone. As if the world had ended in that particular area."

"When you use the word 'Battle', are you insinuating that there was a low number of combatants or that it was short compared to actual wars?" Chifuyu inquired, not liking the implications either answer would mean.

"...Both," Kail answered regretfully. Ichika inhaled a sharp breath of air as both he and Chifuyu realized that if both the number of combatants and time was low and the collateral damage could be described as Armageddon, the strength of each combatant must be akin to armies.

"Exactly how low is the number of combatants and how long is this War going to be?" Ichika asked. Chifuyu was glad that the young man was showing initiative, asking intelligent and relevant questions rather than focusing on his interest in Kail's magic.

"Well, we're looking at 7 'teams' of 2, so 14 total. As for the duration, the last one I was involved with ended in two years," Kail answered. Chifuyu and Kail sighed in relief. Apparently Kail's opinion of a War's duration was a lot different than theirs. The shortest war on record was the Anglo-Zanzibar War which lasted 45 minutes with relatively low collateral damage. In fact, the ten shortest wars ranged from the aforementioned 45 minutes to 42 days, as a simple database search returned. It was a matter of concern that 14 people took two years to destroy a country, but with the 467 registered IS as well as the numerous qualified pilots in the world, Chifuyu felt confident that they would be able to control the situation.

At least until Kail continued, "Of course, that particular war ended in the annihilation of my world."

Chifuyu felt a chill run down her back while Ichika went as white as a sheet. Kail's world was destroyed due to a 'War'? This was way beyond the scope of the Academy, much less a refugee from another world. But, this was no time to panic. With the stakes this high, Chifuyu could afford no missteps. Releasing this information would send the world into a panic, definitely making this mess a lot worse than it was already. However, Chifuyu needed a lot more power to deal with this. But then again, she still didn't have all the information she needed. "Why did this War result in total destruction? The purpose of War is to gain power over another. Destroying the world should not be a result nor an objective of the actions of any sane individual."

"True, but there are some circumstances you aren't aware of yet," Kail informed them. Suddenly, his stomach broke the serious mood with an almighty gurgle. With a blush, Kail gently rubbed his stomach hoping to coax it into silence.

With a sigh, Chifuyu dismissed the two, saying "I'll hold you to the demonstration after class today. Eat lunch quickly and return here at 1300."

With a quick bow from Ichika and a salute from Kail, the two boys left just as Yamada entered, carrying a tray of udon for Chifuyu. Together, the two teachers started to work on making multiple corridors so that the other students could practice enclosed battles en masse.

* * *

><p>"Tempura udon?" Kail repeated after Ichika identified the course in front of him. Ichika had grabbed a course of broiled fish for himself, but with being released so late, these were the only meals available to eat. They didn't even have time to change out of their uniforms, so they got quite a bit of unwanted attention as they left for the cafeteria. As the cook apologized over and over, Ichika noticed a majority of the apologies went to Kail, who had a good relationship with him when he was Sever. With an uncomfortable look on his face, Kail forgave the cook and awkwardly walked away with the dish to a vacant table. Ichika gave the cook a look of understanding and moved to sit with his roommate. As nice as it was to be the only guy in an all-girls school, Ichika had always wanted to another boy be enrolled in the school so he wouldn't be alone anymore. He spent a good majority of his free days at his friend Gotanda Dan's Japanese restaurant playing video games in order to get away from the rampant femininity he was forced to deal with. With Dan, and now Kail, he could be a little more crude and informal than he was when dealing with the girls. And he knew for a fact that Kail was a man through and through. Not like with his last "male" roommate. At least if he did walk in on Kail in the shower, there would be relatively no awkwardness due to them having the same parts. Ichika erased that last thought from his mind, he really did not like where this latest train of thought was taking him.<p>

"You mind switching with me, Ichika?" Kail asked, eyeballing the larger tray of food hungrily.

"You a fan of fish, Sever?" Ichika wondered, using Kail's alias while in public.

"Not really, it's just you have a lot more food in front of you than I do. And I'm famished."

Taking another look at his tray, Ichika noticed that he had a good amount of food, indeed. In addition to the broiled mackerel, he had a large portion of rice, some small pieces of sashimi, and steamed vegetables. Relative to Kail's large bowl of soup, it was definitely more filling. "Sure, have at it," Ichika agreed, and the two exchanged their plates.

Ichika watched as Kail attempted to use the chopsticks to snag a piece of fish and fail repeatedly. "How did she do this?" he grumbled, the small piece evading capture for the umpteenth time.

"You told me earlier that you took over her existence," Ichika whispered, not wanting the girls in the other tables to overhear. "Doesn't that mean you have her skills too?"

"Not at all," he mumbled back, still attempting his awkward grasp. Ichika stole Kail's chopsticks and positioned them correctly in his roommate's hands. Kail thanked Ichika and proceed to practice the grab while explaining, "My skills are my skills, my talents are my talents. The only thing I have of hers is her reputation and her body." Kail noticed the confused look on Ichika's face and delved further, "I told you that Sever and I are hermaphrodites that were raised differently, right? That means our genetic information holds the possibility of either sex. I just...reformatted the body to fit my personal image of myself."

"That's...a bit too much information," Ichika managed to say. At the word "hermaphrodite", Ichika suddenly lost his appetite. He stopped himself from imagining the obvious, slightly perverted implication of that word, and forced himself to concentrate on forcing down the tasteless food., knowing that he'll need the energy. Instead of shrimp and noodles, all he could taste was a plastic rope and a sensation of hot liquid. As he ate, he watched Kail ponder a course of action using the eating apparatus. With a snarl, he snapped one in half, creating a jagged pointy end on both halves. Reaching over to a cleared portion of his tray, he rubbed the two frayed ends together, shedding numerous splinters into a neat pile. Finally, he used the sharpened ends to cut out a small chunk of fish. He speared it and placed it inside his mouth, a very ungraceful method of eating. For the sake of appearances, Ichika decided to properly teach him how to use those things when he got a chance. He chewed slowly, a look of discomfort growing on his face.

"What's wrong? It taste bad?" Ichika inquired.

"No, the taste is fine, but there's something odd," Kail informed him.

"Oh no! Oh no! Don't eat that!" An alarmed whisper cried to the two boys.

"Nohotoke-san," Ichika identified the newcomer.

"...Nohotoke-san, what's up?" Kail nervously asked.

A flash of discomfort and embarrassment flickered in Honne's face as she looked at Kail's bare chest, but she quickly suppressed it and explained, "The fish, the fish! I think something is wrong with it. We might have had a bad batch or something. A few of the other girls have already left for the infirmary or the dorms."

"That's weird, he's usually really good about using fresh food," Kail countered, probably judging from his inherited memories.

"Well, yeah, but word around the cooking club is that he's been really depressed for some reason," she whispered conspiratorially. "I think it's because his favorite cook hasn't been by to visit in a while. You should do something about that, Sebu-chan," she winked at Kail before leaving to join one of her other friends. The girl in the pigtails wasn't present either, probably another victim of the fish.

"Hmm," Kail inspected the fish from all sides. "Hey Ichika, keep an eye out for me, would ya?"

"What are you going to do?" Ichika wondered, checking all around them for signs of eavesdroppers or other nosy people. Luckily, the room was mostly empty now, the admiring girls heading to the stadium to change back into their IS pilot suits for the next half of class. The stragglers kept to themselves, but conspicuously stole glances at the two boys.

Kail put an arm around Ichika and pulled him closer to the food, using their bodies to shield his actions from the curious gazes.

"Trace on," he mumbled, and touched a finger to the fish. He noticed a familiar grid cover the entire tray of food for an instant. Then, Kail pulled his finger off the fish, a tiny glob of black goo on his finger. He wiped off the thing with a nearby napkin before explaining, "That was a trace amount of crude oil. I used Alteration to pull it out, but I bet the batch was contaminated when it came in."

"Magic's quite handy, isn't it?" Ichika noted enviously.

Kail released Ichika's shoulder and allowed them to straighten up. "Not really, it's situational at best, and not the best thing to invest time in. Honestly, if it wasn't for _her_, I'd have quit a long time ago."

Ichika gave him a look that begged for more information.

"Fine, I'll you later about it, according to the clock we've only got 10 minutes to finish." With that, he abandoned the chopsticks and started shoveling food into his mouth with his hands.

Ichika efficiently devoured his meal with the grace Japanese were known for. As he watched the decidedly ungraceful method of eating on part of his roommate, there was no doubt in his mind that he was definitely a boy.

* * *

><p>There was something wrong with Sever, Honne thought.<p>

Ever since she last saw her after their little excursion on their beach trip, she had been acting differently. Of course, now that Sever had been outed as a boy, Honne figured that it was because of their differences in gender that Sever couldn't act normally around her. In fact, she liked her friend Sever and wished that their relationship could just go back to normal. Of course, it didn't help that she let her yaoi fantasies get the better of her and spread this morning's delicious gossip. She definitely would need to apologize for that and confront Sever personally about it, but right now she had to work on school.

Academically, Honne was struggling with the basic sciences and theories regarding IS. Unlike her older sister, who's recommendation as the third-year's student council's vice-president got her through the door, she was utterly abysmal at studying and only passed the entrance exam due to learning those theories via experience with her sister's IS. In order to stay enrolled in the Academy, she had to prove her worth as a pilot, hoping that her exceptional scores with a basic IS would offset her academic scores.

The two boys entered the stadium and quickly took their positions in the formation they were in before lunch, right before the lunch break officially ended. The first thing Orimura-sensei addressed was the absences in their class.

"I'm aware of the cases of food poisoning that happened during lunch time. Dunois, Takahashi, Satou, Huang and Yamanigashi have all reported their illness. As for the chef, he will be taking a temporary leave in order to regain his discipline. Cooking will be supervised by the assistant chef until his return."

Honne flinched a bit at this news, she had told Sever to do something about the chef, but how could he when he had left? Unfortunately, what's done is done and she needed to focus on class right now.

"We will now separate into groups of four, each headed by our demonstrators and Bodewig," Orimura-sensei ordered. "Bodewig has been trained to fight with partial summonings, so learn from her experience. Group leaders, after sparring with each member of your group, start having them fight each other. I expect you all to be able to organize it such that all your members have the opportunity to fight each other once."

Honne caught the distressed look Sever gave Ichika, who smirked derisively. Seeing this, Orimura-sensei quickly motioned over to Sever, who sprinted to her and had a quick word. After that, Sever returned to his group, going out of his way to smack Ichika in the back of the head. Ichika returned it with another derisive smirk and a fist bump.

Honne sighed and stared upwards into the clouds. She envied how close Ichika had gotten to Sever so quickly, it had taken her a full year to get that comfortable with her. But then again, it made sense since during that time Sever was a boy pretending to be a girl. Close relationships were probably a risk he didn't want to take, especially one with a carefree gossiper like her.

And then, there was the incident from this morning. Try as she might, regardless of how she wanted to talk with Sever, she could not get the image of their entanglement out of her mind. She felt her face getting warmer and warmer as she started imagining, well, things that wouldn't make it into a kid movie, for a start.

But just for a second, she imagined herself in Ichika's place, and her heart skipped a beat. For just a second, the adrenaline in her body spiked. For just a second, she felt a hole wrench itself open in her soul, only to be completely filled by the daydream. For just a second, Honne wondered if this was what Nirvana felt like; but if it wasn't, it damn well felt like it. But it only lasted a second.

"Alright, everybody. Form a line and we'll do a bit of practice. All of you have Uchigane, but you've personalized your Preset right? As you saw in my battle with Sever, anything goes. Feel free to use whatever you think is necessary to take me down. With battle conditions like this, it isn't very wise to use a full summoning since you'll get smashed against the ceiling, so concentrate on only using what you need," Ichika explained to her and her group. Apparently, her daydreaming caused her to be placed in Ichika's group. The sudden interruption to her psuedo-Nirvana caused the daydream to break down. She hoped that the hole was just like that daydream, temporary. But now that the hole had made itself known to her, it refused to leave. As she listened to Ichika's instructions on how to actually partial summon, she felt a deep irritation settling into her gut, one she knew was caused by the hole.

Well, whatever. She pushed everything – the changes in personality of Sever, her worries over her academics, her jealousy of Ichika, and now this new found irritation – into a small corner of her mind. Now was the time to train. And by train, she meant beat Ichika up. Honne wondered why she felt the inexplicable urge to inflict violence upon Ichika, but something from the very core of her being told her it would be very therapeutic for her irritation. But until her turn, she was going to watch Sever a bit more. It seemed that all four groups were going to run the same way: the demonstrator using their quickly-earned experience (Save for Laura Bodewig) to assist the relative novices one-on-one in controlled combat. After the introduction, all four leaders started scribbling out a little tournament bracket either in the dirt or using the IS AR, one that would ensure everyone's chance to fight. She requested to fight last, an request Ichika was quick to grant. Her reasons were twofold: it would allow her to watch Sever for a good amount of uninterrupted time, and Ichika would be tired after his gauntlet of fights. If Ichika was aware of her intentions, he probably would have at least hesitated a bit.

She ignored her group to watch Sever's group. She noticed that by some trick, all of the members of his group were of the close combat type, including a certain person that Honne titled "Final Boss". Sshe was dressed in a white IS pilot suit, her IS in standby mode twinkled in the wind, sounding a cute chime that didn't trick Honne at all into underestimating how overpowered her IS really was. Just like Honne asked of Ichika, the Final Boss requested the final position as well. However, unlike Honne's new irritation, Honne's irritation rolled off her in droves, all directed towards the unlucky former cross-dresser. It felt similar to Honne's own irritation, but deeper and more focused. Sever had no choice but to accept those terms, an action Honne and anyone else would agree with after witnessing that level of one-sided animosity. His group quickly decided an order. Sever and the first girl, Nakanishi of the baseball club, entered the corridor, summoned their IS right arms and took a stance. With her sharp eyes, Honne watched Sever's mouth open and close, as if muttering a mantra with a rhythm of 4-3-4 syllables. He didn't do it before in his first fight, Honne wondered what kind of effect it would have on Sever.

Nakanishi pulled an IS claymore from the xtradimensional port on her side. The heavy zweihander required two hands, so she chanced the partial summoning of her left arm. With a smile, she drew both arms behind her back, moving towards the far wall to give her room for a full baseball-like swing. The weight of the weapon only increased the stability of her stance, there was no stopping this attack.

Sever's mantra switched to a pattern of 4-4, and unlike before his eyes remained open. Within them, Honne saw something that unsettled her greatly, something she could see even from the far distance she was: the sheer abject terror of a novice in a fight he was not at all qualified for. The old Sever would've easily ducked under the telegraphed swing, but this Sever took it hard in the IS arm. The follow-through smashed the boy into the shield, the impact creating a ripple of color in the corridor barrier. All action stopped, eyes drawn to the sound of the dull impact. Honne watched in horror as her friend Sever crumpled to the ground after being released from the weapon, eyes wide in shock and pain. Orimura-sensei ran a few steps, before slowing down to a stop. Honne watched with amazement as Sever slowly got up, eyes still wide, and painfully settled into a ready position. Orimura-sensei clapped her hands loudly to get everyone's attention and shouted, "Continue!" With hesitation, everyone in the corridors returned to their tasks, but those awaiting their turn now focused on Sever's match.

Nakanishi reset her sword behind her, but she hesitated in delivering her next strike. At first, Sever was confused by the hesitation, but realized his face was the problem. He was still in shock. With great effort, he closed his eyes and returned his face to a neutral emotion. He opened his eyes once more, his face curled into a look he must have thought was determined. Instead, he looked slightly ill.

Still, Nakanishi seemed to understand Sever's intentions. She unleashed her attack, the same swing as before but somehow even faster. Although slow to react, Sever succeeded in jumping back, the blade nicking his armored arm. Nakanishi smiled, jumped to the other side of the corridor and followed up with a slightly slower horizontal slash aimed at Sever's feet. For the rest of the engagement, they continued this dance. Nakanishi favored wide strong swings, but the small space limited her to horizontal slashes. Sever wasn't able to do anything but back step, but was able to run past her on the rare occurrence she misplaced her step and stumbled. Each time he passed, Nakanishi attempted a wayward backhand in an effort to fend off the undefended side attack. Luckily for her, the attack never came, Sever was concentrating too much on the flailing hand to attack. Then their dance would continue in the opposite direction. The spar ended without anymore clean hits, both Sever and Nakanishi breathing heavily. However, Honne noticed yet another disturbing change in her friend.

With her experience, Sever should have known that the backhand was merely a desperate attempt at defending her side, one with barely any appreciable strength. Instead, Sever treated it as a legitimate threat, twisting to evade it even though the attack wasn't anywhere close to in range. It was if something had caused her to forget how to fight! Honne couldn't even imagine something like that. Even now, her every muscle twitched with the memory of all the time, all the repetitions, she and Sever practiced their techniques on each other while training for the Inter-Class Tournament. She was sure it would be the same for Sever, muscle memory was something everyone had. So, how did she forget?

After a minute's rest, the next girl entered the corridor, the library assistant Dona-chan. Just like Nakanishi before her, Dona was a close combat type who favored huge swings, however she did not exercise as often as Nakanishi. She summoned her IS arms, then pulled a huge ax from the xtradimensional port. However, her unarmored legs were not strong enough to hold her upright. She fell down on her rear comically, Honne suppressing a small chuckle. Frustrated, she summoned the rest of her legs and attempted to stand, but the added height caused her to smash her head into the ceiling. Dazed, she recalled the legs and unequipped the ax. She rushed at Sever, flailing her arms dangerously. But Sever had just remembered how to evade in the most brutal way possible. With wide open eyes, he gauged the range of each arm and repeated the small back steps. This was basically a replay of the first fight until Sever attempted something different. Dona-chan had overreached with one of her punches, and Sever decided to throw one of his own. However, it wasn't the short, compact karate-style punch Honne remembered him throwing before. It was a wide hay-maker, using his entire body to throw one punch.

And he missed. The extra inertia from his IS part dragged him forward. Dona-chan dodged the stumbling Sever, who finally lost his balance and face-planted into the dirt just as time expired. Honne shook her head: now the attacking style had changed, for the worse. It was almost as if this was a completely different Sever. But he looked exactly as he did in the past, save for the fact he was acting like a girl back then. Well, trying, he wasn't totally successful, now that Honne actually thought about it.

Either way, she knew that she had to confirm her suspicions directly, not from superficial observation. And the best way was a direct confrontation. As Ichika handed her the little device that gave her an AD with a partial summoning, Honne decided to turn off her brain for a second. She had a few new strategies she wanted to test on her unwitting guinea pig.

* * *

><p>"Keep your eyes open. Don't run, dodge. Don't get hit, block." A beaten and weary Kail intoned these two phrases over and over in hoarse whisper. Slumped over Ichika's shoulder, he repeated this mantra in a monotonous rhythm, taking a step with each pant.<p>

The two stumbled into the room. Ichika swung the limp Kail's body onto his bed, then took a seat beside him.

"All right, all right, it's finished, man," Ichika calmed him down. "Take a shower, we gotta meet Chifuyu-nee in her office soon. Seriously, you smell like smoke, man."

"Yeah...yeah," Kail agreed. Ichika shoved a fresh change of clothes from Kail's drawers into his arms. Kail confusedly entered the bath, leaving behind a a scented trail of burnt cotton. Ichika painfully removed his uniform, exposing both the IS pilot suit underneath and the myriad welts crisscrossing his body.

During the last fight of their gauntlet, Ichika fought a disturbingly aggressive Honne. Ichika had always known the girl to be an innocent and carefree type of girl, who just happened to have a high proficiency for battle. She was also known for changing her battle strategy at random, almost as if she were trying to find a type of style that suited her best. But nothing could prepare him the absurdity of her newest strategy.

It had started off like normal, Honne had equipped her IS right arm, that short tanto and the sheet she had used during the Inter-Class Tournament. Ichika charged her, but Honne countered with an even faster, low charge. Ichika realized with a shock that the low charge had made Honne almost perfectly horizontal. From that position, she summoned her full IS for an instant. In that instant, Ichika noticed that Honne had added external armor to her Preset, making her so large and bulky it almost filled the corridor. However, Honne made full use of her instant of summoning.

"Ignition Boost!" she had shouted, and accelerated to near subsonic speed, the weight of her external armor slowing her down considerably. However, that speed coupled with her girth and the narrowness of the corridor created an unavoidable attack. Unable to reverse direction, Ichika planted his feet to arrest his forward momentum and absorb the impact as best as possible. The charge sent him flying away with a slight rotation caused by a light followup attack from Honne. Immediately, as she made contact, she unequipped her IS, landing clumsily on her hands and feet. Ichika had right himself in mid-air and landed gracefully a good distance away from her. He felt a sudden itch on his back, and reached behind to scratch it.

KABOOM! KABANG! Two explosions resounded within the corridor, one behind each of the combatants. That crazy Honne had somehow attached a light-weight high yield explosion on his back. The AD had reduced the damage to his body to a simple dizziness, but it still propelled him uncontrollably towards Honne at a speed close to Ignition Boost due to his low weight. In addition, Honne had detonated a similar explosive behind her, the sheet absorbing the damage the AD couldn't. Ichika took an incredible strike to the face, a combination of his momentum, Honne's momentum, and the added strength of her swing. In fact, if he hadn't concentrated the AD around his head, he might have not had one anymore. "Double Supersonic!" She yelled as she swung, probably named for the fact that relative to her victim, her tanto was about twice the sound. Of course, Ichika wasn't thinking about that, he was trying to stay conscious. He was vaguely aware of Honne mounting him, then striking him repeatedly with the broken blade. She got a few strikes in against his weakened AD before something blasted her off of him. With dazed eyes and an aching chest, Ichika saw Houki in full IS standing protectively over him. Glancing past her, he saw a psychedelic hole glistening with color expand rapidly in the corridor shield. Past that, he saw his sister Orimura-sensei standing with dual katana, one pointed at Houki, one in the opposite direction. Finally, he saw Honne and Kail tangled together against the wall of another corridor, Kail's clothes still smoking and his IS arm reduced to slag. Both had dazed looks on their faces, Ichika guessed they had been knocked unconscious.

Orimura-sensei had immediately ended the class early for them, having Yamada-sensei take over the class and escorting the four to the infirmary herself. Honne had regained consciousness quickly, so Orimura-sensei had given the two girls a stern lecture on the responsible use of heavy artillery. After chewing them out, she sent the girls back to their dorms for self-reflection. As for the unfortunate victims, she had the doctor look over them. After prescribing some ointment, he released them to spend a little more time helping the food poisoning victims. Orimura-sensei had left the boys as well, telling Ichika to bring Kail and meet in her office in a half hour.

Kail woke up a little after everyone had left, mumbling that mantra over and over. Ichika couldn't get him to say anything else, but he allowed Ichika to help him back to the dorm so that they could get ready to meet her.

Ichika reached into his pocket to grab the ointment, but remembered that he had slipped it into Kail's since it was uncomfortable for him to carry both him and the medicine.

"Yo, you mind if I grab the ointment from your clothes?" he called through the door.

"No, not a problem," was the answer back. It seemed like the shower had gotten Kail out of his daze, he spoke loud and clear through he door. It was great to not have to worry about things like privacy or whatever, Ichika thought as he opened the door. Kail had his back to Ichika, who didn't exactly attempt to focus on Kail's body. He quickly recovered the ointment from the discarded clothes before him and closed the door. Covering his wounds with the pungent cream, he was relieved to feel the stinging pain fade away.

Kail exited the shower fully dressed after drying and re-braiding his ponytail. He grabbed a small bundle from his discarded uniform while Ichika changed into a fresh one. Together, they left for Orimura-sensei's office. Upon arriving, Orimura-sensei had them lock the door behind them and sit down. She turned in her chair to watch the recorded broadcast on the display behind her chair (subtitled in Japanese).

"...the terrorist attack on the small island of Kahoʻolawe in Hawaii resulted in no casualties as the civilians were evacuated to the near island of Niʻihau. According to US officials, terrorists attacked the Fairs Corporation personal house in retribution for refusing to aid their activities. Acting CEO Marshall Davis was quoted as saying, "'The Fairs Corporation makes no deals with terrorists. We are a true blue American company, devoted to making the world a better place through quality and inexpensive goods.' In addition, both the Fairs Corporation and the US government released a joint press release, thanking IS Academy for their quick response and assistance in dealing with the situation..."

"As you can see, we've agreed to publicly acknowledge our involvement in Hawaii," Orimura-sensei explained. "Before your...participation, the original Sever created quite a ruckus. Thanks to her, approximately 40 tons of high-yield weaponry decimated the city on that island to the ground within a night. There's no way either the US nor IS Academy would be able to cover this up, so instead we bent the truth a little bit. Touted as a joint operation between our groups, this press release should temper international relations quite a bit. Hopefully, we can use the threat of terrorist existence to have the world work together to combat your War, Kail." Just as always, Ichika's Chifuyu-nee was thinking ahead, even able to spin original Sever's chaos into something that could give them an advantage.

"That shouldn't be necessary, Orimura-sensei," Kail declared. This earned him a look of frustration from both Ichika and his sister.

"This is the fate of the world we're talking about," Ichika yelled, slamming his fist on the desk. Orimura-sensei glared at Kail, but allowed her brother to vent all their frustrations. "Now that we know about it, we should do absolutely everything we can to stop it."

"That's the point," Kail specified, "There might not be anything you can do to stop it."

He held up a hand, interrupting Ichika's objection.

"You see, the War is between 7 'teams' of 2. As far as tradition is concerned, the only combatants should be those 14," he explained.

"You mentioned that before, '7 teams of 2'. Exactly who are they? Why is it only them who are...allowed to participate?" Orimura-sensei inquired. From her tone, Ichika guessed she had no desire to abide by "tradition" right now.

"Let me continue my explanation from before," Kail requested, "before my stomach rudely interrupted us." He allowed the other two to settle into comfortable positions in their chairs while he got up and started pacing back and forth, trying to get his thoughts in order.

"In the history of my world, there were Five Wars, known as the Holy Grail Wars. As you might have guessed from the name, the objective of each War was to obtain the Holy Grail."

"What purpose did this...'Holy Grail' have?" Orimura-sensei asked.

"The Holy Grail granted a wish to the victors; the stories say any wish could be granted."

"What do you mean by 'any wish'?" Ichika wondered. "Are we talking wealth? Fame? Power? Maybe even immortality?"

"...I don't really know," Kail regretfully admitted.

"But there's been five of them! How could you not know?" Ichika pointed out.

"There isn't really a lot of information about the Wars themselves. In fact, the only information I have is regarding the Fifth War. And that War ended with no clear victor. In fact, I was told the Grail was destroyed. Although it seems the war I was involved with proved my mistaken." His face hardened a bit after that last part. Remembering that must have been really hard on him. Nevertheless, he gathered his courage and continued his explanation.

"The Fifth War, and apparently the other Four were private affairs. The only reason the Fifth was made public was due to the fact that it devastated both the infrastructure and ecology of the country that hosted it. It was a War that lasted only a week.

"The War is between 7 teams of 2, a Master and his Servant. That's a strict rule I have to abide to. Us Masters and Servants fight each other until one remains. That one team claims the grail, and that's then end of the War. That's why I shouldn't need your help, Ichika, Orimura-sensei."

"Master? Servant? And what are you talking about 'Need our help'? You called it a War! It could result in the end of our world! With all these rules, what you're describing is more like a tournament! Like a game!" Orimura-sensei declared angrily.

"Now that you mentioned it, it is like a game," Kail agreed in a dark tone of voice. Noticing the change, Orimura-sensei allowed Kail to continue his tale.

"You see, the problem with involving third parties is that it starts the chain of escalation. If a master asks for help from outside the magic world, other masters try to do the same. Somehow, word will spread about the Holy Grail's true powers. Other people besides Masters and Servants will try to acquire it. Instead of combat between 14 people, it suddenly escalates into a full-on World War, but one where Mutually Assured Destruction isn't an issue. With the power of the Holy Grail, the final victor could just rebuild the world in their image.

"That's exactly how my World was destroyed. But in that World, there was no victor and the Grail disappeared, leaving my World for dead. And that's why I can't risk having outsiders get involved with the War."

"Wait, then why are you demonstrating your skills to us?" Ichika asked.

"It's because I trust you, and not only that I thought I could use you to help me keep this thing under wraps," Kail answered. "Once the War starts proper, I'm going to disappear. Until then, I'll use Sever's identity as a cover. I hope you two can assist me in keeping this all a secret. Please, I beg of you." He hung his head down in humility, bowing low.

Ichika glanced at his sister, conveying his willingness to help through his eyes. However, Orimura-sensei was not convinced. "What do you want to do with this wish, should you win the war?"

Shocked, Ichika wondered why she chose to fixate on that part of his explanation. Wasn't it obvious? With his world destroyed, he could wish it back, or wish to go back in time and prevent it from happening.

Kail shook his head. "I haven't decided what I want to do yet," he admitted sadly.

"What?" Ichika blurted out. "How could you not know yet? If I had a wish and that problem..." He let his voice trail off as Kail put up a hand.

"When I was learning magic, I was told a story called 'The Monkey's Paw'," he began. "A long time ago, a mysterious merchant offered to sell to a young nobleman the mummified paw of a monkey, telling him it would grant three wishes. Not believing him, the nobleman asked him to prove it. The merchant use the first wish on a cask of water, which appeared before him in a puff of smoke. Inviting the nobleman to take a sip, he convinced him to buy the paw for most of his money and property. Waving him goodbye, the merchant advised him that the greater the wish, the greater the cost it will take to grant that wish. The young nobleman ignored that wish, using his second wish to accumulate the same amount of wealth he had just spent. The monkey warped him to the future, where he found out that due to his careless spending, his parents had died in an act of mutiny perpetrated by their workers. They had left behind a will entitling the nobleman to their investments, which had earned enough profit to equal the amount he spent.

"After 87 years.

"Not only that, but the way those investments had acquired their profits had been called into question and were in a huge scandal. At that time, he stood to lose everything, so he pocketed as much wealth as he could and used his last wish to return him to the time he bought the paw. Upon doing so, he accosted the merchant to get his wealth back, but was immediately beset upon by his security, and subsequently put to death for assaulting a king. His pocketed wealth was appropriated to the poor as a show of consideration. Upon his death, he asked what was the cost of his final wish. The king who disguised himself as a merchant answered that it wasn't a cost, it was a punishment for making it do the impossible. The paw was just a tool for doing what he himself are capable of at a faster pace. For asking it to rewind time, an impossibility, it punished you by taking away that second wish. Not only that, but it showed you a glimpse of the future to come, although it cost you your ability to capitalize on it.

"The story ended there, but they say that's the basis of magecraft, the ability to replicate science." With that said, he pulled out the bundle he recovered from his uniform: the clump of string he showed previously to Ichika. Closing his hand around it, he used the skill Alteration to separate it into tiny shards of string.

"Alteration is a magecraft that manipulates the physical structure of existing objects. However, this specific use can be done simply by cutting the string repeatedly with scissors."

He closed his hand around the bits of string and reopened it, the string once again made whole and continuous.

"Likewise, I can theoretically re-spin these threads into one long continuous strand."

He held up the narrow thread's end to Ichika, who understood what he wanted to do. He wound it onto his hand while Kail tugged at the rest. Ichika could see that he was pulling on it with a staggering amount of force, if it wasn't for his first hand experience with the skill he probably would've have alleviated the tension as to not break it.

"This is Augmentation, one that removes weakening factors from a material. If necessary, I can even increase it's strength, but only temporarily." He stopped the skill, and the thread broke instantly.

"The Holy Grail is like the Monkey Paw, One has to be careful with what you wish for. It's the reason why there wasn't a victor in my War. I know I need to figure out what I want, but it will be for naught if I don't acquire it first." He said the last words with a deep conviction, as if he had thought about this point for a long time. Ichika could see the echo of time spent concentrating on those thoughts reflected in his face.

Apparently, Orimura-sensei agreed. With a heavy sigh, "I'll cover for you and assist you to the best of my ability. Tell us what you know."

Kail stood back up slowly, tears flowing unbidden from his eyes. Ichika realized this is why he kept pushing this explanation back further and further. Kail had delved this deep into his past and now he couldn't mask the sorrow he felt from losing his life, his world, and most likely his girl. Ichika decided to shelve his curiosity and listen to his story with patience.

Kail took a deep breath to calm his nerves and began again, "Alright, we were talking about third parties right? In that case, I should probably start talking about the primary parties.

"Masters are mages who use the power of the Holy Grail to summon Servants. By the way, this isn't magecraft, I won't be harmed for using it's power but I would suggest you not try to do the same." Kail intercepted Ichika's interruption before he could say it.

"Why not?" Orimura-sensei instead asked.

"Using the Holy Grail's power requires the use of one's personal magic reserves, their od," he explained. "If you don't know how much you have, you could exhaust your supply of od and not be able to maintain the Seals needed to control the Servant."

"Why would you need to 'control' your Servant? Earlier, you said you were a team, so why would you need to control them? Aren't you working for the same goal?" After seeing the demonstration, Orimura-sensei seemed to have acquired Ichika's curiosity for Kail's magic.

"Servants are Epic Heroes of legend, given flesh and bone in order to compete for the Grail. However, they have their own will, pride, and ideals, not to mention their own ulterior motives. Although it's in their best interest to look out for their Masters, Servants are not obligated to follow their Master's orders. That's what these are for." Kail removed his jacket and rolled up the right sleeve of his under shirt. He then took off a thin band from his upper arm, a skin-colored wrap that covered a mess of cuts that glowed with a crimson otherworldly power. However, the pattern of the cuts were obscured by a series of scars Kail had acquired back on the Hawaiian island.

"I had attempted a Servant summoning earlier this morning, but was interrupted mid ceremony. Although the Command Seals appeared, my Servant did not. At the very least, this proves I've secured my eligibility to be a Master. After I recover some more of my od, I'll try again."

"Then, do we know if the War will start?" Ichika asked cautiously. "Will we be attacked?"

"I don't know. Through the Grail, I know that not all of the Masters have been chosen, but I have no idea where they are nor if they've summoned a Servant yet," Kail answered.

"That thing's got some fantastic powers," Ichika commented.

"True, but even though I know this much, I'm sure that there's even more secrets that it holds."

"Then it's in our best interest to keep this under wraps. Until a War-related battle comes up, you should remain 'Sever Panganiban'. This means keeping up with your course work. Unfortunately you've received some undue publicity recently, and I'm sure unusual activity will be easily noticed," Orimura-sensei advised Kail. "This also means that I have to go back to being a normal instructor, so I won't be able to assist you directly. However, the minute something War-related comes up, I have to be the first to know, understood?"

Orimura-sensei stare was like a sharp sword pointed directly at Kail's headed. He had no response but to nod in affirmation after her intimidating glare.

* * *

><p>With that, they were allowed to rejoin the class in the stadium. The class was just about finished with their spars, so they didn't even bother to change into their pilot suits. As expected, the girls crowded around the two boys, offering to help them with their injuries and such, fully intending to smother them with attention.<p>

Somehow, they were able to convince the girls to leave them alone, but not after being force-fed dinner. The two flopped down on their beds, stomachs heaving with the sheer amount of food they had to eat into order to placate the girls.

"Do you go through this every day?" Kail complained. He let out a long belch, one he had probably kept in for a long time. At least he had the decency to be polite in front of all the girls.

"For some odd reason, Japanese girls really go for injured bishonen," Ichika explained.

"...What?"

"Never mind."

"But, still, don't you think it was a bit excessive? I mean, look at our stomachs, man."

"Yeah, but Rin and Houki aren't here right now. While they were here, they prevented large groups like that from surrounding me, but with them gone..."

"I see. In that case, what was up with the two foreign girls then?"

"Laura and Cecilia?" At the sound of their names, Kail heaved a tiny bit. Those two were in particular the scariest. They had hogged Ichika to themselves, forcing a good majority of the girls to crowd him. He definitely blamed those two for what happened to him.

"They're...a bit special," Ichika admitted. For some reason, he couldn't fathom why those girls had such an interest in him, he wasn't a good match for any of them, even the ones close to him. After all, he never knew what the girls were thinking nor the intentions behind their actions. It was obvious to him that they liked him (Laura's affection incredibly obvious), but an insensitive person like him who had to think long and hard about topics like this had no right to be with any one of those girls. It was easier for him to focus on his goal, to be strong enough to at the very least protect his friends and be a force of good.

"Hey Kail," Ichika asked, a trace of trepidation in his voice.

"Yo."

"You said that not all the Masters have been chosen, right?"

Kail closed his eyes for a minute. "Yeah..."

"Can you teach me to be one?"

Kail sat bolt upright in his bed and stared angrily at Ichika's face. Just like Kail with Orimura-sensei, Ichika found himself robbed of all motor functions staring into Kail's dark eyes.

"Do you intend to betray me too?" he asked in a ominous monotone.

_Too?_ thought Ichika. "N-No, I would never do that."

"How the hell can I believe that?" Kail's hand strayed to the emblem on his hand, ready to summon his IS.

Ichika broke out of his trance and reacted, placing his hand over his bracelet in order to do the same. Suddenly, he realized he was just escalating the problem. With great effort, he told himself to trust in Kail's honest nature and forced his hand off the bracelet. This action defused Kail's aggression, who similarly moved his hand off his hand and relaxed his face into a stern but neutral shape.

"Look," Ichika explained, allowing both his honesty and determination to show in his face. "The more Masters you have on your side, the better chance we have of getting that wish. Not only that, but we'll also have twice the number of Servants and Command Seals. I may not know much about the War itself, but larger numbers is always an advantage."

"Unless you're fighting in a narrow corridor," Kail joked, the tension leaving his face with a chuckle.

Ichika flinched, "Not if you're Honne." He told Kail about the fight he had with that crazy girl.

"Ooh, that sounded like it hurt."

"Still does," Ichika answered, removing his uniform top and exposing his welts to the cold dormitory air. "How about you?"

"Houki was really going to town on me. She was holding her shorter sword in her hands with this weird grip. It was like she had one hand on the hilt and the other on the bottom of her blade. With it, she was not only able to do full slashes within the confines, but they were incredibly fast as well. I had no chance of evading, man, even though I was doing so well against the other girls. She's in a class all her own."

"True, true," Ichika agreed, having been on the receiving end of her talent numerous times.

"Anyways, she had me against a wall and just started wailing on me when she froze all of a sudden. Next thing I know, she thrusts the sword into my abdomen and I go flying, propelled by a blast of purple energy. I concentrated the AD at that location, but then something hard hit me in the back of the head where AD was at its minimum. Everything went black, then next thing I know I'm in a cold shower with burns all over my torso." he removed his uniform top as well, exposing what looked like a target on his navel, but the colors were all shades of burnt skin. Ichika sniffed the air, all of a sudden it smelled like ash. Kail must have noticed it as well, as he put his undershirt back on.

"Does it still hurt?"

"Like a beast. Every ripple this shirt makes is agony, man."

"Here, this ointment numbs the pain. Doc said to have you use it too."

Kail reached over and put a small dab of it onto his burn. He immediately heaved a sigh of relief as he spread the ointment all over his burn, massaging the numbing cream into his skin.

"So...about the Master thing?" Ichika inquired cautiously.

Kail let loose another long sigh. "Well, let see what we can do about opening your magic circuit first. Good thing you got your shirt off. This is going to be wild." His smile looked every bit as dangerous as when he was angry to Ichika. He stood petrified, not able to resist the searching hands of his roommate.

* * *

><p>"Her room is really close to here, Assassin," the girl whispered.<p>

That girl walked down the lonely hallway, the majority of the others either in their rooms doing homework or practicing at the stadium.

Her shadow cast by the ceiling lights manifested a thin reed of pale light about where its mouth would be. "That girl, Houki, seems to be one of the more powerful girls in your year. She will make a variable addition to our forces," it whispered back in that soothing, gentlemanly voice.

Every time she heard him speak, his sultry speech sent shivers up her spine. She was sure that if it weren't for his class suppressing his skill, the entire student body would be flocking to him in a similar manner to when Ichika first enrolled.

"Having to adapt my skill set to a lowly class like Assassin. The first thing I do after establishing my dominion is hunting down lancer and stealing his class," he grumbled to himself.

The girl didn't care one way or another what he thought, the abilities of her Servant complimented her own very well. After learning about the IS, Assassin had exulted in the fact that the school was already like a miniature army. Assassin's ability - Şeytan Savunması – allowed him claim an area as his dominion. As long as he remained in that area, Assassin's physical strength and magical defense would increase to legendary proportions. At that strength, he was confident that no Servant would be able to defeat him. Unfortunately, Şeytan Savunması required the acceptance of those within that area. With his original skillset, he would simply decimate the area with his Noble Phantasm. If he were the only one in the area, he would be able to activate Şeytan Savunması. However, his class change had altered it to one more suited for espionage. Now, simply by touching it to a human, he could implant a suggestion into their minds. From the shadows of his Master, he spent the day traveling from shadow to shadow, implanting the suggestion "Obey me." Unfortunately, he was unable to influence a majority of the girls. The pair noticed that the higher the sync rate between the pilot and the IS, the harder it was to implant the suggestion.

The boys and Orimura-sensei were a completely different problem altogether. Every time he got close to one of them, his Phantasm was forcibly repelled. Luckily, since he was in shadow form and the classes attention was on combat, no one noticed except for his Master. So Master and Servant had planned a direct encounter. They would surprise those they couldn't subjugate and use the full power of his Altered Phantasm by calling out its name. They would continue this strategy until the school was under his claim. With the power of the Academy, he could easily dominate the world. And after the world became his dominion, it was be easy to track down and kill the remaining Servants, allowing he and his Master to win the Grail.

"Ma'am," Assassin whispered urgently.

"Yes?" His Master replied.

"Who resides in this room?"

She read the door plate: "1025. This is Ichika's room."

"I'd like to attack this room first," Assassin requested.

"What's so special about this room?" His master cautiously asked.

"One of the residents here had a mysterious scent – something...alluring yet dangerous. I'm not sure, but something about him causes my blood to race faster yet run cold. If possible, I would like to dominate or eliminate him first."

"Which resident?" Her voice trembled a bit at this question.

Ever the respectable gentleman, he ignored the tremble and answered seriously, "The one who can't fight."

His Master relaxed instantly. "As long as you don't hurt Ichika, it's fine. In fact, can you do something extra for me? Please?"

The thin reed of a mouth extended into a sly smile. "If possible, I'll suggest he court you, ma'am. However, I feel obligated to tell you, it won't be as satisfying if you don't earn his affection normally."

The girl noticed a trace of dismay in her Servant's voice. "You've had experience in matters of love?"

"Of course, Ma'am. However, I'm not adequately suited for dispensing advice in matters such as this. Please forget my rambling thoughts."

"...I won't forget them, but I'm not too confident in my ability to attract him like that. If you do give him that suggestion, can you remove it so I can earn his love normally if I want?" She asked.

A dark tendril rose up of the shadow and pointed under her breast. "You'll have to forgive me but I take a certain amount of pride in my abilities, even diminished as they are now. I'll do it in exchange for one of those," indicating her Command Seals.

"I understand. Let's see what the two boys are up to."

The girl put her ear near the thick door, the only way to hear what was going on inside the soundproofed room.

"Good thing you've got your shirt off." A male voice that wasn't Ichika's said ominously. "This is going to be wild."

"What, what are you going to do to me?" An abnormally soft voice that the girl couldn't believe was Ichika's responded.

"Just relax, it'll be easier to open if you just...relax."

"H-Have you done this before? This-this is my first time..."

"Of course, you're not the first. I promise, I'll be as gentle as possible."

"Ahh! Stop it! It feels so creepy."

"I can't help it, I need to find your pressure points. If I don't find them, I can't force your muscles to relax."

"I can do it myself!" Ichika snapped.

"Then stop clenching!" Sever's voice admonished him sharply. 'It's like you're constipated or something!"

"Sorry, sorry. How's this?"

"That's great. Wow, your skin is so soft. How did it get this way?"

"An old roommate left some lotion here. Every now and again I rub it all over. It gets into the crevices real nice."

"I see. Alright, how's this?"

"Wow, I can't feel anything."

"That's no good, you have to remember this feeling," Sever noted with disapproval.

"Gyaaah!" Ichika groaned with pain. "How are you putting that in there?"

"Relax and breathe! Relax and breathe! It's almost over! Come on!"

"No! I don't want to do this any more! I quit! Take it out!"

"No way, I can't stop now, not in the middle of this! Besides, you asked for this, remember!"

"I take it back! I take it BAAAAACKKKKKK!"

"Just a little...bit...more-"

"AHHH!"

The girl could hear the boys exhausted pants through the door. Between breaths, Ichika managed to say, "Wow, that, that was incredible. It feels so warm inside me right now."

"Ma'am," her Servant whispered with a tone of urgency.

The girl whipped around silently and quickly. "What?" she seethed through clenched teeth.

"Your nose is bleeding, quite heavily I might add." The shadow had within its boundaries a puddle of blood which had dripped from her nose. He had also somehow caught the specks of blood that flew as she turned.

"Ma'am, I'm afraid if we remain here for much longer, you won't have enough blood to sustain your body. Shall we abandon our mission?"

"No, no I'm fine." She pulled out a dainty silken handkerchief and plugged her nostril with it. She chanted a little spell and the burst blood vessels in her nose instantly closed. She then placed the handkerchief into the puddle of blood the shadow held. She chanted another spell, absorbing every bit of blood into the silk. Throwing the bloody cloth in a nearby trash can, she stood up unsteadily. The sudden blood loss had diminished her sense of balance. She felt the black tendrils support her from the back, keeping her upright. The tendrils brushed off the dust on her uniform with a few flicks and retreated back into her shadow. With her blood level as dangerously low as it was, she resisted the temptation to listen in once again into that room 1025. She felt as if she had only had enough energy for one attack. She slowly walked to Houki's room and tapped on the door.

"Just a minute," came the reply from inside.

Houki opened the door, and immediately the girl mumbled, "Restrain her."

The Master's orders were the Servant's orders, and the Servant's orders were immediately followed by Houki's already subjugated roommate. The girl who the Master didn't recognize by name wrapped her arm around Houki's neck and shoved her fist in her mouth. By cutting off Houki's airway as well as impending her ability to breathe, Houki was quietly and easily taken down, her head supported by her roommate's lap. The Master's shadow crept along the ground, reaching for Houki's neck. The handsome Servant's head popped out of that shadow. Houki strained her neck to try to see this apparition, but her roommate held her tightly with more force than she looked like she could give. Her thin, spindly limbs creaked attempting to restrain Houki's much more muscularly developed body. Still, she held on stubbornly, giving Assassin enough time to use his Altered Phantasm: "Kazıklı Be - Ayrılınmış Köpek dişi Kral".

"It's done, Ma'am." Assassin reported before retreating into her shadow. Houki slowly closed her eyes, her lips mumbling one last word. Visibly troubled, the girl had her Servant's servant carry Houki onto her bed. The wounds made by Assassin's Altered Phantasm – two holes in the side of her neck near the collarbone – had already started to heal, most likely an effect of Assassin's weapon.

The girl had the servant rest as well, before retiring to her own room. Now, not only was she drained physically, but the use of Assassin's Phantasm had drained her magical supply as well. Now in the safety of their own room, Assassin resumed his original shape. The gentleman knelt next to his Master, took her hand and started caressing it gently.

"Assassin, that Phantasm was lovely," she murmured, already half asleep.

"Thank you for your compliment, Ma'am. Even though it's been changed into such an ugly form, I'm glad you still appreciate it's beauty."

"What was it called again? Your Altered Phantasm."

With a smile, he leaned in close to her ear and whispered in a melodic, rhythmic, hypnotic voice: "Kazıklı Be - Ayrılınmış Köpek dişi Kral". She didn't even feel the weapon pierce her flesh, the twin wounds on her neck rapidly healed themselves as Assassin watched with a cold stare.

* * *

><p>"What did you put inside me?" Ichika held out his right arm, glowing with a pale silver light.<p>

"A diamond. You know, a clump of carbon that was heated and pressurized heavily. It naturally occurs in nature, I just helped it along. Best part is that it's made out of your own hair, or more specifically the carbon in your hair. In all honesty, I wish Alteration had been invented back when I was still an apprentice. My body rejected 5 or 6 gems until that guy finally found one that worked, and even then it was a long shot," Kail explained.

"So, does that mean I can do Alteration, too?" Ichika asked hopefully.

"Not a chance. All I did was create a switch for your magic circuit. Before you learn magecraft, I have to teach you control first. Remember the story of the Monkey's Paw? That story is the basis of magecraft, which means you need to know what you're capable of before you start using it. Otherwise you'll ask for too much and be punished for it."

"Then the Grail is like a consequence-free version of the Paw?" Ichika tried to simplify the explanation, trying to get the lesson in words he understood.

"Hmm, as I explained it yes, but..." Kail trailed off as he struggled to figure something out.

"What's wrong?"

"Something's been nagging at me ever since I explained the Grail War to you two," Kail informed him. "But I just can't seem to put my finger on it."

"Well, you should sleep on it."

"Yeah, good idea. How about you?"

"You know I should, but right now I'm bursting with adrenaline. I'd really like to take a couple hours practicing with this thing." Ichika waved his glowing arm, making a trail of light that followed his every movement.

"Alright, let's do this then." Kail walked over to the snack drawer and pulled out a relatively new pastry. He took a bite out of it, then held it over his open mouth. A few drops of water spilled into it, and he handed it to Ichika. He tried to take it in his right arm, but Kail slapped it away. He handed it to Ichika's left arm and told him to squeeze. He expected it to yield under his strength, but the pastry was rock-solid. In fact, Ichika felt as if he had strained a muscle by squeezing it.

"What I'm going to teach you is Self-Reinforcement. I'd teach you Normal Reinforcement, but I'm terrible at common magecraft," he apologized. "You'll have to learn the deviant arts."

"I didn't even know magic existed until yesterday. You could teach me to pull a rapid out of a hat and I'd still be fascinated."

"...I don't know see what purpose an action like that holds, unless 'rabbit' means 'ferocious animal you throw at you enemies'," Kail gave Ichika a sidelong glance. "Anyways, Self-Reinforcement is relatively easy. All you need to do is concentrate your od, that warmth you feel in your arm, into your bones. You see, the body limits your physical strength because your skeleton can't support it. That's why bodybuilders and strongmen fortify their skeletons with lots of calcium and build up huge muscles so that their bodies can support their strength and build. However, with magecraft we can strengthen that support artificially. I can get into the specifics later if you want, but with that support, our bodies naturally unlock more of our inherent strength. So your task is to figure out the least amount you need to Reinforce your hand to perform a specific task.

"I want you to squeeze this until it shatters. You can't cheat because the pastry will cut your hand a tiny bit as it breaks. Now, the trick is to be careful with the amount you Reinforce your hand. Too little and you won't have the strength to crush it. Too much and your hand won't be able to move enough to crush the bread. Not only that, but it will probably hurt. What you want is enough od to break this guy. After that, I want you to remember what that amount feels like. It's important to know how much you need to accomplish a certain task.

"After you do this one, I'll make a few more of varying hardness, but they'll all require Reinforcement to break. You pass if you can break all of them, and then break one last one in the morning under three tries. If you don't, you're buying pastries."

"Understood. But, how exactly do I put...od into my arm?" The word still felt uncomfortable in Ichika's mouth. " I can't exactly imagine moving warmth without some kind of heat sink or something to move it with."

"Ugh..you're way too similar to me, my friend. If you were in my world, you'd probably be ostracized like I was." With that said, Kail left to brush his teeth in the bathroom. "Ooh, here's a good example!"

Kail turned on the faucet in the bathroom full blast, then turned it down to a dribble. "Pretend your will is like this faucet and your od is the water. Now, water here probably comes from a plant so its relatively infinite, but your od is not. Pretend your faucet is hooked up to a bucket instead. Now, if you tried to conserve water, you'd only use enough to get your toothbrush wet and then turn it off. Think of your od the same way, just enough to crush the pastry."

"Ooh! I get it!" Ichika watched as the intensity of the pale silver light grew stronger and weaker as he opened and closed his mental faucet.

"But you know," Ichika continued in a voice barely loud enough to be heard from the bathroom, "Even if we were ostracized I think we'd still become fast friends."

Kail spit into the sink, "Dammit, Ichika, it's stuff like that makes you popular with the girls."

"I wish relationships only required saying nice things like that," Ichika sighed wistfully.

"Some do -," Kail interrupted himself with a loud gargle. "Just find a girl that wants what you had to offer. I did."

"How did you find her, anyways?" Ichika inquired. Maybe he'd pick up some pointers from Kail's experience.

"Uhhh..." Kail trailed off. "Actually, it was more like she found me."

"I see. Oh, that reminds me: Have you done your diary entry yet?"

The loud clap of realization echoed throughout the small room.

"Crap, I forgot. Quick, I need a prompt!" Kail rushed out of the bathroom and quickly changed into sleeping clothes. He then got out pen and paper and sat at his desk.

"Well, how about the time you met your girl?"

"Better than nothing, I suppose."

"By the way, what's her name? You didn't write it down in the last one."

"Huh?" Kail opened a drawer and checked. He stared at it for a full 5 minutes before reporting, "Hmm, you're right."

"Hey, hey, it shouldn't take that long you know."

"Give me a break, reading isn't exactly my forte."

"Neither is fighting."

"Get back to training," Kail snapped.

"Yea, yea," Ichika responded. He found that while opening and closing the faucet to be easy, placing it at a specific location for a specific flow was rather difficult. As Kail had said, too much od made his hand stiff and hard to move for some reason. Not only that, but he could feel the od drain into the atmosphere. Worried about the bucket analogy, Ichika closed his od faucet. He cautiously gripped the bread, applied sleight pressure, and slowly opened the faucet.

"By the way," Kail interrupted Ichika's concentration, "What's the kanji for Orimura?"

Ichika irritatedly traced the kanji in the air with his free hand, then got back to Reinforcement training.

"Thanks, this will save me some space. It would be a pain to keep writing 'Orimura Madoka' every time I have to mention my love's name."

"WHAT?" Ichika lost his concentration, opening his od valve completely and shattering the Augmented pastry.


	4. Ch 3 Inherited Existence

Chapter 3 – Inherited Existence

Disclaimer: Infinite Stratos and the Fate universe belong to the original creators. Any use of them is strictly for non-profitable and non-derogatory purposes, covered under the Fair Use Act.

* * *

><p><p>

_Prompt: When did I first meet her?_

_Her name was Madoka Einzberg Orimura, known amongst the boys in the Clock Tower as the Invincible Snow White Queen. Just like the title inferred, she was unbeatable; continually placing first in all aspects of training from theoretical principles to practical application. Her gifts led her to be chosen as the youngest of seven pilots for the newest MagiTech innovation: IS or Instrument Suits._

_She was chosen to be a pilot specifically because of the "Invincible" part of her nickname. As part of the mage program, students were expected to compete in any event that could be competed in. It was a practice that not only encouraged independent study and practice, but it had the additional effect of demoralizing the weak of mind and making them drop out early. In a normal school program, this might be considered inappropriate, but those without a determined mindset would not go far in the world of magic. Allowing them to drop out early was actually considered an act of compassion. But even with this practice, the Clock Tower still had hundreds of students, and Madoka Orimura had trounced each and every challenge she was given, overpowering and out-thinking any who stood in her way to be the best._

_The other part of her nickname came from the fact that she was also apparently a beautiful girl. I remember one of the more poetic boys describe her as"a rare regal beauty, one supported by the graces of ancient pride and nobility; whose otherworldly pure white skin seemed to defy nature itself with a quiet unmoving power." And then there was her heritage: the Einzberg in her name. Known as one of the families responsible for creating the Holy Grail, the Einzberg were like royalty in the mage world. Anyone bearing that name, even as a middle name, were automatically treated like a noble. From that legacy and that flowery statement, "Snow White Queen" was coined._

_But it was the "Invincible" part that earned her the right to accelerate her study and graduate early, then get chosen to be an IS pilot for her troubles. These IS were meant to further the evolution of mankind through the fusion of magic and technology. Should the initial run work, the Mage's Association planned on increasing the number of IS, in an effort to increase the standard of living throughout the world and to expand our presence throughout the universe._

_Of course, like any new technology or magical advance, there were bound to be problems. That's why the Clock Tower introduced the IS Support program at the same time as the IS pilot program. It was a program intended to create IS support, basically the compliment to an IS pilot. A support would spend the next year working with the IS inventors; learning how to maintain the prototype IS, studying in depth the theory the IS worked on,and most importantly getting acquainted with both the role and the parts of the IS they were assigned too. However, the qualifications to being accepted were quite special._

_Firstly, one had to graduate from the Clock Tower and be recognized as a full, responsible adult mage. Fulfilling this qualification wasn't terribly difficult, as the Clock Tower also introduced accelerated course plans. Anyone who could complete the coursework and prove their competence would be accepted as a graduate. All candidates had one year to graduate from their respective programs._

_Secondly, after the ceremony conferring the students' mage rank and title, each pilot will choose one candidate to be their support, meaning that out of all the applicants only seven would gain that coveted position. Apparently, the IS program will respond best in a two-person party. When the pilot and the support have a high degree of affability, known as a sync rate, the IS will become more efficient in power consumption and energy efficiency. This made it easier on both the pilot and the support to perform their tasks._

_However, finally each candidate had to be deemed proficient in the arts of both Tracing and Mineralogy. This was the reason why only 12 people even met the qualifications to be considered for the program, although applicants numbered in the hundreds._

_Tracing wasn't really difficult, however it took a particular talent a very rare number of people had. The ability to look at a part and Project it completely, recreating its physical structure, its history, and its experience. To those that had any form of that ability, Master Shiro Emiya happily accepted them into his program and carefully cultivated it into something resembling his own ability of Tracing. He was a kind, gentle teacher who had evolved the weak Projection technique into something that could match the Noble Phantasms of the most powerful Servants. Even with the flood of people trying to get into his program after the IS Support program was announced, he calmly screened through each applicant, tenderly comforting those who showed no sign of the ability and patiently assisting the newbies who only had a year to gain proficiency on top of their normal or accelerated coursework._

_Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, the excluding factor that condensed the hundreds of applicants to 12 candidates was Mineralogy, taught by Master Rin Tousaka. Master Tousaka was...a person that took constructive criticism to an extreme. I'd put down my true feelings for her and her teaching method, but even now I fear that she'll find some way to reach beyond the veil of death to punish me. Suffice it to say, I had little respect for the woman. And I'm sure she felt similarly._

_The reason why these two proficiencies were necessary was because this experimental magi-technology also happened to be very fragile. Without the pilot Reinforcing the IS continually, the IS would fall apart under its own weight due to the density of what it was made of and the Square-Cube law. But it didn't mean that it wasn't prone to parts being broken completely or malfunctioning. It was the job of the support mage to understand the material itself (a wonder material developed specifically for IS) and to Trace that broken part: effectively an instant repair. By combining the two disciplines, it was found that projecting a Tracing onto what it was supposed to be made out of instead of prana caused it not only to retain its shape permanently, but to also not suffer Rank Degradation and be just as strong as the original._

_In any case, after the year of accelerated courses and hurried proficiency in Tracing and Mineralogy (somehow), the 12 qualified candidates gathered in a small classroom. Both Master Emiya and Master Tousaka sat at the front, while I sat in the back near a wall, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible. It was there that I heard (and narrowly escape) the slamming open of the double doors leading into the room. As if they were one giant entity, the seven IS pilots entered the hall in lockstep, approaching the head of the close where the two magic professors sat._

"_Master Emiya, it is … a pleasure to meet you again after all these years," I heard a voice hesitatingly declare. Her clear, strong voice reverberated throughout the classroom._

"_Madoka-chan, you don't have to be so formal with me," Master Emiya chirped back, a smile dancing in his voice. "You can call me Father, or Daddy, or Papa, or-"_

"_Understood, Master Emiya," she coldly repeated herself with a bit more force, interrupting Master Emiya's suggestion."However, 'Papa' is the one who is with Mama. Right now, no one is with Mama, so there is no one to call 'Papa'. There hasn't been one for 12 years, Master Emiya."_

_Master Emiya's face furrowed in shame. "Madoka-chan, there were...extenuating circumstances. I mean, it was for the good of the world that I left Ilya to join this magic school with Rin. IS has the potential to wipe poverty and disaster off the map, to explore the unknown depths of the see and reach out throughout the universe for knowledge and prosperity. This is the evolution and maturity of the human race we're talking about!"_

"_Yes, Master Emiya, thanks to you, Master Tousaka, and the IS development team we now have magi-technical suits that allow for new opportunities in our future. I truly do respect your decision, Master Emiya, that's why I'm here as well. So does Mama, she's the one who pushed me to excel this much. However, Master Emiya, that is still...still no excuse to why you couldn't at least write a letter to us!" Her voiced cracked as she let her emotion pierce through her formality._

_Master Emiya had no retort, no argument, no excuse to explain his insensitivity to his estranged daughter; nor did anybody attempt to defend him. No matter how kind and gentle he may have acted, it was well known that Master Emiya had struggled these past 12 years trying to bear with both the fact he did not come from a mage family and he headed an unpopular program. Although he was begrudgingly given the rank of Master and a staffing position at the Clock Tower, he was looked down upon by all the other Masters and program heads. And then there was the favor he owed to Bazett..._

_After a period of uncomfortable silence, Master Tousaka cleared her throat rather conspicuously, drawing attention from the father-daughter confrontation. She introduced the seven pilots to us, whose names escape me at the moment. They each recited their names with feminine voices, and judging from their names and accents they probably had different ethnicities as well. After the curt introductions, Master Tousaka ordered,"Now, please choose amongst these candidates who will be your support." As always, her directions were short and crisp, at least until she got irritated. "You've all been given time to review the specialties and talents of the qualified before you. Once you make your decision, Master Emiya will inscribe the Syncro Seals to the both of you, binding your od to each other and the IS you are assigned too."_

_Immediately, a woman with a mature-sounding voice called out,"I would like Soki Tousaka, please." I heard a groan from the candidates as well as from the pilots._

_Soki Tousaka, the son of Master Tousaka, was famous amongst the entire program for both already knowing how to Trace weapons before enrolling and being the only one able to tolerate and actually benefit from his Mother's. Under Master Emiya's guidance, his skill in creating Swords was almost on par with the Master's. In addition, Master Tousaka spent all her extra time with him, grinding into him advanced lessons in Mineralogy; lessons he would happily extend to anyone who asked. In what was left of his spare time, he helped the rest of the class refine their powers, which had the effect of refining his as well and increasing the group's overall growth. The entire group knew he was the best they had to offer, and it seemed the pilots knew that too. Except for one voice that I was sure did not join in the group's depression. Master Emiya called the two to his seat in the front, and with a low voice even I couldn't hear, inscribed the Seals. Groans of pain came from both Soki and the pilot, groans that would be repeated as the other pilots quickly sought their intended supports before the others took them away. Eventually, the last pilot to choose was the one whose voice did not join the initial disappointment when Soki was chosen._

_I heard a chair scoot nosily as Master Tousaka chastised Orimura, "Hurry it up, dear. Shiro's getting tired."_

"_It's fine, Rin," Master Emiya assured her. "I've made her wait for 12 years, I can wait for at least that long for her. And as soon as this is finished, I'll visit Ilya."_

_Master Tousaka snorted in disappointment at the sound of her name, but didn't continue her criticism._

_Finally, after what felt like an eternity, Orimura-san spoke, "I choose him."_

_At first, I thought she had pointed to one of the students. After all, by this time all three of the males save for one had been chosen and by process of elimination, it had to be him. I turned around to head back home, when Master Tousaka's rebuttal proved that my assumptions were not always spot on._

"_Ms. Orimura," Master Tousaka,"Please take this seriously. You may have a grudge against your father, but that is no reason to shame his life work by taking a support that is not only physically disabled, but he isn't even a proper mage. What could you possibly need from this one?"_

"_It's because of that physical disability that I need him," Orimura-san stated. "In case you've forgotten, my focus was in Mineralogy. And as for Tracing, well I am my father's child..." I heard a slight hum as the weapon was thrown, than an audible thwack as the weapon embedded itself in the wall near my head, right where my head would've been if I hadn't stopped in surprise._

_Well, that was interesting. I was so engrossed in thought, wondering who Orimura-san had really pointed to, that I had forgotten to flinch. I had thought that I was far enough away to avoid attention like that. I was so shocked by this seemingly random action that I disregarded my policy of inconspicuousness and clearly incanted, "Trace on." The well-known invocation of Master Emiya._

"_What is it?" Master Emiya prompted me, a trace of pride in his voice. He had been helping me hone this ability since we first met. I Analyzed the weapon, a spear of about 1.5 meters in length. It wasn't a fancy weapon, it had no engravings nor elaborate features common to weapons of legend. A spear of practicality, the quarter meter head was a simple long triangle, beaten to a hard edge instead of ground like most modern knives. The lance also lacked a guard for the head, making it more like a javelin than a spear._

"_A magical spear, it calls itself 'Gae Dearg'," I responded in a dead monotone, not used to speaking in front of a large number of people. In fact, I believe this is the first time I've spoken to someone that wasn't Master Emiya in the past three years. "It has all the Magical Properties of the original weapon, including the ability to sever all ties to prana. This means that this weapon will negate all constructs created out of prana, including Tracings, Spells, and Magical Constructs below its rank. As a physical weapon, however, the edge is dull and the spear itself is full of vacancies and contaminants within its molecular crystal structure. If you tried to use this normally as a weapon, it would shatter as soon as it hit an object off edge or sufficiently harder."_

_I ran my hand down the shaft of the spear towards the head still lodged in the wall behind me. I stopped at a point along the shaft about 20 cm from the point of the spear. "Excessive transverse load applied here would cause crack propagation that would split the weapon into small pieces. But, it's fixable. Shall I demonstrate?"_

"_Please do," Master Emiya agreed eagerly._

_I Altered the spear according to its memory: how it was forged, how it was maintained, how it was used before becoming known as Gae Dearg. Surprisingly, it allowed me to do so almost instantly. After returning it to the shape it remembered, I Altered the weapon in accordance to its own wishes: streamlining the design to how it thought it should look. Particles of dust fell lightly to the ground as I relieved the weapon of its extra unwanted weight. In addition to that, I Augmented the Traced construct,repairing the crystalline structure of its molecules and removing contaminants within. In the end, Gae Dearg's shape was mostly the same, but I had made it slightly smaller, slightly lighter, slightly more aerodynamic, and gave it a much finer edge; all qualities only a master artisan would notice at a glance. But most importantly, by fixing the Tracing at the molecular level, I had given it much more strength and durability. "This should work a bit better as a weapon," I started in that same dead tone of voice, "at the very least it won't break after a couple of swings like the it would've before. However I can't do anything about its magical properties, and since it's still a tracing, it'll be about a rank weaker in strength."_

"_I see," Master Emiya responded."Well, in the end the Trace Ranking system is based on my own opinion on things, so we should use a more practical way of gauging its power. RHO AIAS!" _

_He held up his hand and an iridescent pink flower of seven petals emerged from his hand: the defensive Noble Phantasm Rho Aias, Rank A based on the subjective scale Master Emiya had taught us. It was said that each petal was as strong as a fortress wall, and not even modern weaponry would make a dent within the first petal. Not only that, but the user was Master Emiya, the Origin of Tracing. His Rho Aias would probably defend against nuclear bombs if he needed it to._

"_I accept your challenge, Master Emiya." With light steps and single pull, the Snow White Queen approached me and yanked the spear out of the wall and gave it a few quick spins. But something was weird: I could hear it humming, maybe even singing. Even though she was spinning the spear at a fast speed, it was nowhere near fast enough to make any sort of sound simply swinging it through the air. Yet, it was humming; rising and falling in pitch just like a song._

"_Hey you," she called out to me,"what did you do to it? It's lighter than when I first traced it. Not only that, but the prana conductivity is incredibly high. I could probably fill this thing with od in a fraction of a second! Wait, is this...Are you telling me this is how this weapon is supposed to be used?"_

_It didn't matter to me whether she was looking at me or not, all I wanted to do was smile and nod._

_The weapon Orimura had traced was long and hard, probably used like a proper lance for mi-range melee combat. But that wasn't the original intended use for the weapon. Rather, it was meant to be thrown like a javelin, to deny and overcome all things unnatural in the world. And in front of me, in front of us, was a big unnatural wall. The epitome of defensive Phantasms was there, a chance to prove to everyone that my deviant skills were just as good as theirs. To prove to Master Tousaka that all those years training with master Emiya were not for nothing._

_I turned towards the girl near me, the one who gave me this chance. I don't know what caused me to do so, but I undid the seal on my eyes for one brief moment; just to see the emotions running through her eyes. I peeked beyond the veil of my seal, my circuits stinging with pain as I broke the oath I made to myself. That was the first time I saw it, the gold and silver starbursts of excitement of the girl I love._

_I heard the scuttle of panic as the students caught between the ultimate defense and singing spear cleared a path for the spear-like javelin to fly. She brought the spinning spear to a stop, most likely to prepare to throw it. As if a lightning bolt had struck the room, a peal of thunder reverberated around the room as Orimura instantly overloaded the Tracing with her od. Then with a heavy step forward, she threw the lance as hard as she could, activating the Traced Noble Phantasm's full power by shouting its name: "GAE DEARG!"_

* * *

><p><p>

**June 10 – After the first-years' first partial summoning practical lesson**

"Why do you write in such a way that makes me want to ask more questions?" Ichika complained. "I don't know what these terms mean. You're not exactly writing for yourself, you know."

"If I remember correctly...I'm writing a diary," Kail retorted with a yawn. "Unless I misunderstood... the intention of the assignment... I'm just doing this to learn how to write …so I don't get kicked out of school. Theoretically, I could just drill myself...over and over...but this way is definitely more productive. As you can see, I've increased the speed of my...writing...two...fold..."

Then Kail slumped onto Ichika's shoulder. Of course, Ichika had more than enough time to brace himself and quickly righted his drowsy roommate.

"By sacrificing your sleeping habits, apparently," Ichika pointed out, carefully jabbing a finger into the heavy dark bags under Kail's eyes from lack of sleep. Kail flinched away and leaned on the wall to try to keep himself from passing out. After taking care of Ichika's magical accident, he had spent the entire night writing a new diary entry, as evidenced by the numerous energy drink bottles Ichika found on his desk when he woke up.

"I'll be fine," Kail promised. "This isn't the first all-nighter I've pulled. I just don't do well during the morning, normally."

It was about 6 in the morning, a full hour before the time they usually woke up to go to class. Upon noticing Ichika's awakening Kail had asked Ichika to accompany him to the roof. In return, Ichika had asked to read the new diary entry, finishing it about halfway up the elevator ride.

"Anyways, Kail. Want to explain some of these things for me sometime?" Ichika asked him with a smirk.

"Sure," Kail answered, then smacked himself a few times for a brief shot of adrenaline. "What do you want to know?"

"Well, what about the 'blindness' thing? You outright stated it in this entry, but before it was kind of ambiguous. In all honesty, I thought you just screwed up some of the accent marks."

Kail snorted in dismissal, "No, I'm smarter than that – Accent marks?"

"You see, in Hiragana and Katakana there are these little marks that change the sound of the character you are using. If you forget to put them down, it can change the entire meaning of the word. For example, when you were talking about the gold and silver star bursts, I thought you were talking about the stars you see when a girl you like gives you a concussion."

"Ahh," Kail murmured, then opened up his diary to the first entry. "Well, I'll be damned. I completely forgot almost every accent mark in this thing. I'll go ahead and fix this. But, yeah I agree: it's not exactly clear what I mean without the-Wait, what?"

Luckily for Ichika, the elevator door chimed that they had reached the infirmary floor and that the car could not go any higher. Distracted by his task, Kail pocketed the diary and exited the elevator car, Ichika following behind him and silently resolving to think before he says something weird like that. They climbed the stairway leading to the roof and took in the sight that awaited them. The sun had just started peeking over the edge of the horizon, bathing both the sea and the campus in a wildfire of red and orange. If the setting sun was the trigger for peaceful slumber, than the rising sun was the signal for a vibrant awakening. For a second, Ichika entertained the idea of waking up early to witness this event every day. Then he remembered that in order to wake up early, he would give up another hour of sleep. With the extra practice Houki and the others put him through as well as this magic training he just started, he would need every spare minute to rest. That reminded him of that painful explosion of od caused him to fall unconscious. With a grimace, he held his right arm in remembrance.

Kail started drawing what Ichika recognized as that same summoning circle from yesterday, taking the time to improvise tools like last time and make it perfect. While he worked on the circle, Ichika asked for the diary back and Kail continued his explanation from before.

"Basically, back in my world I was functionally blind. If I kept my eyelids closed, I would see nothing but pure darkness. But if I opened my eyes, I would see people as an outline filled with some combination of color. These colors would explode into different shapes depending on the change in their emotions. When I was younger, I enjoyed playing tricks on people to get them to switch their emotions, but that got me in a lot of trouble. When I started learning magic, the first thing I did was seal my eyes closed and try to stay out of trouble."

"You mentioned that in your diary. What exactly is that?

"Umm, basically it's a curse that prevents me from doing something. Unless the feelings behind it are strong, a human's natural resistance will make a curse like that fail. But since it was me who placed it on myself, it bypassed that resistance and made me totally blind for the next 10 years or so. Of course, I could undo it partially, but that caused me pain until I was able to fulfill the oath I made in the first place.

"But since I've come to this world, I've been awed by this thing you called sight. Being able to see things like this beautiful sun makes me feel like it was worth the risk to come here."

Kail stopped to heave a deep sigh. "Of course, I would gladly trade this sight just for the chance to save Madoka." With a shake of his head, he resumed his work in silence.

Even though he allowed Kail his peace to work, Ichika wanted to ask more questions: What's a Noble Phantasm?, What's Tracing?, What happened to Rho Aias? But most importantly, how did you have IS? _Well, it's not like our world held a patent on the IS, _he rationalized. _They must have made similar technological advancement, even with the presence of magic. But it makes me think that maybe I __haven't been treating this seriously enough: if Kail's world, __that had both IS and Magic, was still destroyed by seven Servants, what hope did this one have?_

"I'm going to try to summon again." Kail had finished the circle while Ichika was lost in thought.

Snapping back to reality, Ichika warned him "Are you sure you should try in your condition?"

"...I'm not sure how to tell you this, but last night I felt a crazy amount of prana get used, and it was incredible close to us as well," Kail confessed. "With the amount that was used, I'm afraid a Noble Phantasm might have been used. If that's true, there might be a Servant within this very school!"

"What, a Servant? We should tell Chifuyu-nee!" Ichika shouted, and started for the elevator.

"Wait a bit, Ichika," Kail grabbed his arm before Ichika could get too far. "Like I said, I'm not sure. I want to verify my thoughts before we bother her. If I summon a Servant, that Servant could use its ability to sense the presence of other servants, except maybe Assassin."

"And if it is 'Assassin'?" Ichika sounded out the unfamiliar word.

"Mmmm, he probably would have tried to kill me first, using that Noble Phantasm I mentioned. That's...basically a very powerful magical weapon."

"Oh, I was wondering about that."

"In any case, I haven't exactly been inconspicuous with my magecraft, any focused mage would be able to track me down quite easily. It would be even easier for Assassin. Since I'm still alive, either they both think I'm not a threat or the two are quite incompetent."

"I see," Ichika relaxed the tiniest bit and walked over to the circle. "But if you've thought all of this out, why did you want me to come with you? It 's not like I had to help you move things around like last time."

"You wanted to become a Master to help out, right?" Kail responded. "I don't think you can cast a summoning spell without a medium yet, but it's probably in your best interest to know what the circle looks like."

"Makes sense." Ichika quickly brought out his cell and snapped a high resolution picture of the summoning circle to study later.

After verifying that Ichika was satisfied with the shot, the mage from another world entered the circle like before. Once again, the design glowed white-hot, and veins of deep violet energy raced down Kail's arm. Once again, he poured violet light into the circle while chanting his incantation. But the atmosphere was different from before. During the first summoning ritual, Kail had a sense of serenity and security about him. Like everything was going great, until Ichika fell off the precariously piled furniture and interrupted the ritual. But this time, the look on Kail's face was different: as if he were going to risk everything on this last try. The crest on Kail's left arm, Deep Purple, was quivering uncontrollably, as if it were afraid of what was to come.

"Kail, your arm..." Ichika tried to warn him, but Ichika couldn't finish the warning. He could only silently watch as Kail forced his power into the circle. He recognized that look Kail wore: it was one Ichika had worn when fighting Cecilia in his first real IS battle, the one he wore fighting the Black IS with Rin, the one he wore when saving Laura from the Valkyrie Trace system, the one he wore protecting those illegal poachers, and the one he wore to defeat Silvario Gospel. It was a mask of determination he had donned numerous times to make sure that no one knew just how much pain he was in. Ichika stood up and braced himself; the only reason for someone to wear that mask of determination is when things were about to go out of hand.

Just as the circle's white light was fully saturated with Kail's violet od, a fierce explosion of prana surged from the circle like a geyser, sending Kail flying into the air. The prana looked almost like a cloud, except while the outside was most definitely a dark purple, the interior and surfaces he looked straight at were almost completely transparent. The dark prana gave off a strange chill, a coldness unlike that of which Ichika had ever seen. A coldness colder than the ice, fiercer than a blizzard...and sadder than the regret Ichika felt when he killed all those people in the helicopter in the Sever Recovery Mission.

He didn't hesitate for a second: "Byakushiki!" In the next, the white IS appeared around Ichika, shredding his uniform to his undergarments. One of the only 4th-generation IS in the world, the white IS was built for a overwhelmingly strong and quick offense, with many thrusters installed on the back of his wing-like shoulder guards. The sword Yukihira Type II in his right hand unfolded, and a blade of energy emerged from the handle, easily as long as Ichika's IS was tall.

With all his strength, he swung down at the circle. If he learned anything from the previous attempt, it was that the slightest damage to the circle with stop the spell. But as the blade entered the geyser, it eroded before Ichika's eyes. With a startle of disbelief, he pulled back the weapon, only for it to regain it's proper length outside of the geyser.

"Okay, then, from below!" Ichika stabbed the sword into the ground and flung it up, rending the ground underneath the circle. But it was no good, the blade simply went through the circle, not even scoring the ground underneath the circle proper, yet he could still see the millimeter-wide cut his sword made in the ground prior to the attempt.

"Then, I'll at least save him," Ichika decided, his eyes focused on the helplessly flailing body of his roommate, juggled by the eternal geyser of dark violet prana erupting from the circle.

"Setsura Protector!" he yelled as he jumped into the geyser of prana. The multipurpose unit Setsura rotated and twisted until it resembled a buckler. From that buckler, a wide round shield of translucent energy formed parallel to the circle and successfully blocked the geyser of prana. Unlike a real geyser's water that would be diverted to the sides of the shield, the mana simply ceased to be as it hit his shield, however Ichika still felt the force from the mana erupting forth. The geyser fought hard to resist Ichika's plug strategy, but Ichika ordered Byakushiki to maintain his position using as much counter-thrust as necessary. Byakushiki's thrusters and the geyser fought hard, eventually settling at a height of about 2 meters (the point where Byakushiki's thrust force limit and the geyser's force equaled out). Byakushiki was able to handle the order, but not without cost: the shield itself was draining his AD at a rapid rate, and the thrusters wouldn't be able to last for more than a few minutes at maximum continuous burn.

But he couldn't think about that; with the geyser stopped, the geyser had stopped propelling Kail into the air, and Byakushiki's sensors told him that Kail was now falling directly toward him at a quick velocity. Ichika detached Setsura and placed it in Static Mode. Using strong electromagnetic forces, the shield would stay in one place as long as Byakushiki was within a meter of it. Unfortunately, those same electromagnetic forces keeping it static would transfer to Byakushiki, so Ichika still had to pour on the counter-thrust. But he could still rotate, so he put his plan into action.

He rotated so that he faced the falling Kail, extending the thrusters as far out as possible while still maintaining his counter-thrust. He waited for Kail to fall into his arms before engaging his Ignition Boost, a burst of thrust that far exceeded the thrusters rated limit and made the main thrusters unusable for a great deal of time after. But that was all he needed, the extra thrust had forced his IS closer to the geyser's spout, Kail's summoning circle. Not only that, but with the force of the geyser increasing as he got lower, it actually served to decelerate the two. _How come I can only do these kind of smart things when I'm in trouble? _Ichika lamented. _No, it's no time to discourage myself. I'm still not finished._

With his right hand, he tried to push Setsura further and further into the geyser, but the augmented strength of the IS plus his own just weren't enough to overcome the geyser. Ignition Boost only lasted seconds at best, and there was no time to call for reinforcement.

_Wait...That's it!_ Ichika focused on that feeling from last night, the feeling of opening a faucet that released his own hidden power. He didn't know whether it was from the adrenaline or his excitement, but he watched that pale silver light surround his right arm as if it were in slow motion. He didn't worry about quantities or conservation, but instead he trusted his gut about how much od he needed to use. He noticed alarms and alerts popping up in his AR, but he ignored them to view later. With the Reinforced arm adding to his strength, somehow he pushed Setsura through the opening of that portal.

"That's all I need!" Ichika yelled as he closed his fist tight, just as his thrusters finally overheated. Setsura expanded its shield, just enough to catch the edges of the summoning circle from below the opening, wherever it happened to be. Just like with Ichika's sword, damage done from underneath the circle did no damage to the opening so the shield didn't simple upend the circle. Quickly, Ichika checked his gauge. Luckily, he had only used a quarter of his AD energy, meaning he had a decent amount of time to wait for Kail to regain consciousness and close it himself.

Just then, Ichika got bitten by the curiosity bug: exactly what was inside that geyser? He gazed deep into the circle, and was met with a sight that was quite difficult to describe. Within that chaos of mana, that unyielding torrent of energy, he saw dozens upon dozens of people locked in a bloodthirsty battle. Both men and women fought tooth and nail on a empty featureless field, except for the scars of battle running like wounds across the barren earth. He focused on the face of the closest person to his field of vision, the IS helping to adjust his focus.

The man he chose was a brute, a large man whose roars shook the very battle field, yet no one else paid them any mind. Every time he moved, his hair shook with wild abandon, like a fertile, dense jungle during an earthquake. He was almost totally naked, except for the loincloth around his ankles. His muscles were huge and taut, and his skin was dyed a dark brown, as if he had toiled under the sun for years. In those muscular hands, he held a giant slab of stone that could barely be called a proper weapon. He swung that weapon recklessly but accurately, targeting the head of a small girl clad in pink.

The girl, for lack of a better description, fit the image Ichika had of a magical girl. She appeared to be both the requisite age and height of those he saw in anime: about the size and age of a middle schooler. Her clothes were fancy and puffy, and bore no practical reason for being so inhibitory. Her clothes resembled that of a sailor uniform, although he couldn't remember offhand a school that used pink as their primary color. She had also had long hair, but had the good sense to at least tie most of it back. The parts she didn't tie hung past her cheeks like sideburns, but didn't seem to impede her vision no matter how hard she shook her head. Yet despite the handicap, she was able to evade each and every blow by millimeters, and even able to counterattack with small bursts of pink light. Yet they had no effect to the half-naked barbarian, not even slowing him down for a millisecond.

Out of nowhere, the half-naked giant was assaulted with a dozen giant arrows, each as long and thick as Ichika's arm, with a rotating tip that drilled its way further into the giant's body. With another earth-trembling roar, he frantically dug them out not because of the pain, but because they impeded his movement. Luckily, that brief moment of immobility gave the girl in pink a moment to break away, then with a mighty leap jumped towards Ichika's vantage point. A black shadow from out of nowhere wrapped around the girl in pink, and then the girl became a monster: some kind of feral beast with an indefinite form, it reminded Ichika of watching old, grainy Bigfoot and Loch Ness monster videos.

It clambered through the air, rending handholds in the air itself as it attempted to climb its way up to the summoning circle. Ichika looked past the monster back to the battle behind it, expecting the giant to follow his former battle power. But he simply jumped into a neighboring quarrel, and like all the other people ignored the departure of the monster and its attempt to escape the infinite battle. With a fierce roar, it opened its mouth, intending to eat both Ichika, Kail, and the IS serving as a plug for the geyser.

"I could really use some help here, Kail," Ichika urgently shook the unconscious boy at his side.

No response from the boy's blackened body, probably an after effect of being bathed in that violet light. His uniform was torn in multiple places, but it fared better than Ichika's. Or maybe not: underneath his exposed skin, Ichika could see red crisscrossing underneath his skin like veins, but in a definite pattern. Not like the magic circuit he showed him before: a random bunch of lines extending to his fingertips. This was a deliberate, sophisticated and complicated pattern that definitely held some significance.

But he had no time to analyze the complicated pattern, that monster was almost upon him. He rotated again, flinging the unconscious body of his roommate into the air. Continuing the rotation, he found himself completely within the mouth of the monster, its teeth obstructing the last few rays of the rising sun. Luckily, he had thrown Kail clear of the monster's reach, but what about him? Would he just float there, allowing himself to get eaten? Was this the end?

"Setsura Cannon!" Ichika disengaged the shield allowed the unit to rotate into its Cannon Form. As soon as it finished the reconfiguration, he fired a dense ball of energy filled with the remaining strength in his IS exited the weapon with an astonishingly slow velocity. It smashed into the stomach of the monster, and somehow began dragging it down. Ichika had expected it to explode, but this was good enough. He rotated once more, towards where he knew the open sky was. Although he couldn't manifest Yukihira II's energy blade, the fold-out armor it was made of had an edge that was more than sufficient for cutting his way out of the monster's mouth.

With a few cuts, Ichika had forced his way back into the red morning sunrise, catching the rapidly falling Kail. He stared back into the circle, watching the ball of energy, the last bit of potential of his IS, drag the monster back down to the infinite battle. With a reality warping shudder, the monster crashed into the chaotic battle, scattering warriors into the air as if they were toy soldiers. With an explosion of pale blue, the monster separated into two forms: the magical girl clad in pink, and what Ichika would term a "Dark Magical Girl."

Unlike the conservatively dressed pink one, the dark one dressed in barely any clothing at all. Rags of black swathed her bust and pelvis, with a tattered red cape hanging off her shoulders. Her skin was the same dark brown of the giant's, but she had the same undeveloped middle school body as her pink counterpart. Even including her face. Ichika did a quick comparison between the two, but besides the clothing and skin color, both dark and pink looked exactly the same. Except while the pink one had a look of confused silliness on her face, the dark one purposefully met Ichika's eyes. Ichika was never a good judge of reading women's emotions, but he was sure that the dark one had a mixture of both anger and frustration on her face.

Then, the portal disappeared in a flash of light, revealing that the circle had cut away the roof in that specific area. Ichika gazed into the room, an unused infirmary unit complete with patient gowns.

"Well, better than that monster trying to eat everything in sight, I suppose." he descended into the hole, barely big enough to squeeze his IS through. After laying the unconscious Kail on the bed, he dismissed his IS. Kail's body, at least the exposed parts, were still dyed the same violet as the prana geyser, with that odd red pattern running under his skin.

"This isn't good, how far did this spread?" Ichika removed the tattered uniform, exposing Kail's sturdy chest. Compared to the last time he saw it (an experience he would much rather forget), it was in a much worse shape. The same deep purple had spread to his torso, with the red pattern underneath getting more and more sophisticated. It reminded Ichika of the tribal fad, a popular fad that consisted of getting tattoos similar to that of Aborigine or underdeveloped tribes living in jungles or whatnot. Taking off Kail's pants, he discovered that the pattern continued below Kail's waistline.

Just then, a door opened with a slam. "Aah, Ichika!" A familiar voice sounded from outside the hall.

"Rin? What are you doing here?" Ichika rushed to meet the Chinese girl at the door. With Kail almost naked and unconscious, the last thing he wanted was for Rin to enter the room and pass the curtain that obstructed the patient's bed from the visitor at the doorway. Luckily enough, the hole in the roof was also occluded by the curtain and no rubble was created when the hole was made, so as long as Rin (or anyone else) did not clear that obstruction, Ichika was free from misunderstandings.

"Ichika, w-w-what are you doing in the infirmary so early? And so...lightly dressed?" she stammered, clasping a hand to her mouth and looking him up and down. If he focused, he could see a faint tinge of red spreading over Rin's petite face. He looked at himself up and down. Thanks to the emergency summoning, his uniform had shredded off completely, only leaving his undershirt and boxers (and modesty) intact.

"It's no big deal, childhood friend #2," Ichika began, calling Rin by his title for her. "You know I like sleeping in light clothing. I remember stripping down to underwear like this back when we were younger and I overstayed my welcome at your parents house."

"Yeah, but we're adults now, Ichika," Rin argued, drawing up close and sticking a finger in his face. Then, she retreated and returned her hand, only to start playing with her fingers. Avoiding direct contact with Ichika's face, she pressed the tips of her forefingers together, than began toggling them up and down uncomfortably. "As an adult, how am I supposed to react when a guy opens up the door in his underwear?"

"Last I checked, Rin, we were still teenagers," Ichika pointed out, a smile of smug satisfaction on his face. "In any case, I'm fine with you seeing me like this. If it were Cecilia-san or Char, I'd be really embarrassed," he added with an uncomfortable shrug.

"And what about Houki-san?" Rin asked him with a cute pout. Ichika liked that about his second childhood friend, how easy it was to tease her and not take a shinai to the face. She wasn't exactly laid back, but she was definitely one of the easier girls to get along with. Still, there were limits to her patience, so Ichika decided to answer honestly.

"I only lived with her for a short time, so I'm not completely sure, but when we did she would be very secretive when we changed. She would force me to change in the bathroom whenever I had to, and force me to wait in the bathroom when only she had to. Yeah, I would suppose I'd meet the wrong end of a practice sword if I greeted her like this," he guessed, spreading his arms wide and giving Rin an unobstructed view of his outfit.

"You know," Rin folded her arms in front of her and nodded, "Judging from the short time I've known her, I'm inclined to agree."

"You know, I think I would too," a voice from behind the curtain added his opinion.

"I didn't ask your opinion, Sever-san," Rin shot back angrily, recognizing the voice.

With a gulp of apprehension, Ichika turned around to look at the newcomer to the conversation. Kail – no, Sever while with company – emerged from behind the curtain half-dressed, but Ichika could see he had fixed his tattered uniform using that Alteration skill, and his skin had returned to its normal light brown. There wasn't even a sign of the tribal patterns he had seen before anywhere on his torso. Whatever he did to fix it, it seemed he was fine for now. In fact, if one were to be uninformed of the morning's activities, one would probably think he had just woken up and gotten ready for school like normal.

Sever shrugged his shoulders and apologized, "Sorry, but its about time for class, according to the clock over there." He nodded at the wall clock, which indeed read 15 minutes before class.

Ichika slapped his head in disbelief, "Crap, how long did we take!" He tried to push past Rin to get to the elevator, but after pulling up her sleeve, she simply grabbed Ichika by the back of his shirt. The fabric stretched as Ichika fought her grip, but it was futile as Rin pulling up her sleeve also meant she was ready to use the power of her IS to retain him.

"Now that I think about it, what were you two doing up here...together? If I remember correctly, there's...o-o-only o-o-o-one b-b-bed," she stammered out, but this time out of irritation.

Ichika could imagine the gears in her head turning, especially after the rumors had circulated yesterday. No, he did not want to appear that way in front of his precious childhood friend!

"It's not like what you might be thinking, Rin!" Ichika shouted. Rin released her grip so that Ichika could turn and face her. He crouched a bit (quite a bit!) in order to meet Rin's line of sight and started to fidget, rubbing his hands together. "We just crept up here so we can...uh..." He glanced at Saver, who motioned behind him. Towards... "The rising sun! So we can see the rising sun!"

"The rising sun, eh?" Rin smirked with disbelief.

"Right, right, the rising sun. it's quite beautiful, you know."

"So, you're telling me you spent the night up here just so you could see the sunrise together."

"Right."

"In a room with only one bed."

"Right..."_ Ok_, Ichika thought to himself, _this is not heading in a good direction_.

"...How..._romantic_?" Rin spat out the word as if it were rotten food.

"Now, hold on just a minute!" Ichika interrupted. Once again, he glanced at Sever. Instead of assisting him, Sever simply smirked back. _That bastard!_ Ichika thought. _He's enjoying this!_

"You know," Sever started, still smirking behind Rin's head, "We really didn't do anything _romantic_." He stressed that last syllable. Rin turned around to face the speaker. "In all honesty, there was no _love_ to speak of. We just slept together."

_That ass! _Ichika screamed in his head. _I'm going to kill him for this. _He would've yelled that last part, but Ichika was struggling to breath while being crushed by Rin's choke hold.

Somehow, Ichika managed to get a hand into the tight hold and pry it open enough to hoarsely protest, "Look, Rin, I didn't use the bed. I slept on the floor, like when we were kids. Nothing happened like you're imagining, I swear!"

"Well, then if it was just like when we were kids, you wouldn't have any problems sleeping with me, right?" Rin yelled.

"Right, right, of course, Rin-sama!" _Anything to get out of this mess,_ Ichika thought.

"T-t-tonight! Tonight is fine, right? And we'll see the sun rise together?"

"Yes, yes, anything you want!"

Rin abruptly released her hold on Ichika, finally allowing him to get the necessary air for proper respiration.

"Well, then I'm going to class, then!" Rin said cheerily, sidestepping the collapsed Ichika and headed down the hall towards the elevators.

"Well, that was interesting. I'll have something fun to write in my diary, tonight," Kail commented, lifting Ichika bodily by his armpits. Ichika responded by driving his elbow into Kail's ribs as hard as he could. Kail stumbled back, definitely feeling the pain but still standing strong.

"That's the second time. At first, I thought you were just out of it and it was just a simple mistake. But you said that kind of thing on purpose, didn't you?" Ichika accused him.

"Totally. I may have payed for it in injuries and embarrassment, but the reactions I get out of you and your friends are hilarious!" Kail declared with a chuckle.

"Shut up, you," and with that, Ichika smacked the back of Kail's head rather hard in retribution.

Just as they reached the elevator door, it suddenly opened, and Rin was once again in their presence.

"Ichika, you'll keep your promise, right?" she verified, a cat-like grin spreading over her face.

"Yes, yes. I will," Ichika responded. With that answer, Rin turned away to hide her face. Ichika took the opportunity to take Kail aside and ask, "What did I promise Rin?"

"You'll sleep with her. Tonight apparently," Kail whispered back.

"Right, right, I'll sleep with her." Ichika nodded in agreement. "Wait, WHAT?"

"I wouldn't worry about it, its just like when you were younger," Kail responded in a soothing whisper. "Not only that, but if I recall correctly, neither of you are adults yet, or something like that, I suppose. Just treat it...innocently."

"Ah!" Rin spun around, pounding a fist into her palm in recollection. "I almost forgot, this isn't why I came back! And as for you -" she grabbed Ichika by the collar of his undershirt "- get ready for class!" And flung him into the elevator, using a strength only called upon by sufficiently pissed off women.

"Don't forget your promises so easily!" Rin yelled into the car. Ichika had been thrown with enough force to send him flying for at least 2 meters horizontally, however that inertia had been arrested by the back wall of the elevator after only one. It wasn't enough to injure him heavily, but Ichika knew he was about to fall unconscious. With blurring eyes, he saw Rin press a button in the car and then quickly exit before the doors shut. As they closed, Ichika heard Rin declare, "Sever-san, I need to discuss something with you."

"Ahh, I feel a lot better, now. I think I advanced quite a bit with him," Rin sighed in relaxation, stretching her arms out wide. "What do you think, Sever-san?"

Sever opened his mouth to answer, but instead a yawn came out. He quickly attempted to stifle it as Rin chuckled good-naturedly.

"Sorry, all jokes aside I haven't been sleeping well. Well, at all, actually. But I'll swing by the vending machines and grab an iced coffee in a bit," Sever informed her. "As for Ichika, well, why don't you just ask him directly how he thinks of you?"

Rin shyly twirled her foot into the ground and distractedly played with her long twin-tails. "That's...uhhh...well...really d-d-direct, you know?" she stammered shyly. "I mean, it's easier to do something and sees how he reacts to it."

"So...throwing the guy you like into a solid wall is easier than simply asking him out?" Kail pointed out.

"Kyahhh!" Rin attempted to suppress a squeal of embarrassment as she cringed into a small ball. "I didn't say anything of the sort! I...like...Eyaaaaahhhhh!"

Rin rocked back and forth, lost in her own dream world undoubtedly filled with Ichika. With a sigh of resignation, Sever lightly tapped the fantasizing Rin with his foot and asked, "Was this what you came back to do? I mean, I don't really mind talking about stuff like this, but I don't feel like it's so important you need to backtrack all the way back up here."

Rin froze, then slowly stood up to her full height. With a serious look on her face, she turned to meet Sever directly eye-to-eye. "I'm sorry, but can you repeat that again?"

"Uhhhh..." Sever hesitated, "'It's not so important to backtrack up here'?"

"No, further back."

"Uhhh... 'Throwing the guy you li-'"

"No, no! Between that and the one you said before!" Rin clarified, a slight blush on her face.

"'I don't mind talking to you about things like this'?"

"Yeah, that!" Rin once again made eye contact with Sever. "Do you mean that? Relax, and tell me truthfully."

With a yawn, Sever attempted to comply, "Yeah, sure. It shouldn't be a problem."

Rin searched the boy's eyes, but found only calm acceptance for the situation with no irritation. With a sigh, Rin broke eye contact by turning her head down. Sever followed the bob of her head with his eyes, worried that Rin found something wrong with his admission.

"OK, I remembered what I came here to do. Follow me, Sever-kun," Rin ordered, switching her honorific to the more informal "kun" suffix.

"Sure, Huang-san." Sever responded.

"Rin is fine, remember?" Rin informed Sever as they entered the room opposite to where he and Ichika had "watched the sunrise". With an upturned flat hand, she motioned for Sever to wait a second as she moved the curtain obscuring the bed from his view. Sever's jaw dropped as revealed before him was the unconscious body of his sister, Natalia Fairs.

"What, when?" Sever stammered. "Is this what she-? What exactly happened to her?"

"Hey, hey, sit down," Rin advised, "You're shaking really badly." True enough, Sever was shivering as if someone had opened a window in the small room during a blizzard. Rin wasn't surprised, she had reacted nearly the same way after she first visited Natalia in the infirmary.

"You remember that little trip you took down to your home in Hawaii, right?" Rin asked, waiting for Sever's affirmation before continuing. "You see, after you left but before we knew that you had left, a silver IS identified as America's Silvario Gospel. We...were told that it was an unmanned IS, and...fought with intent to destroy it. Eventually, Ichika was able to use his sword to pierce through the IS and force it to deactivate." Rin paused for a second, giving her a chance to gauge how Sever was reacting to the news. Sever showed no emotion on his face, save intense concentration. Rin thought he had stopped paying attention before he lifted his head to look at Rin, wondering why she had stopped. With a nod, she continued her story.

"America told Orimura-sensei that they would recover the IS itself, so we returned back to the resort. It was there that Orimura-sensei informed us that someone had hijacked America's communications and was using us to fulfill their dirty work. She had us scramble: Cecilia, Bodewig, Dunois and myself to recover Silvario; Houki, Ichika, and herself to intercept the recovery team and...to recover you."

"Yeah," Sever answered for the first time since the story began. "I remember that clearly, that they came to get me."

"I'm surprised you made it out alive, honestly, especially with the skills you showed us yesterday. Of course, your IS was heavily damaged apparently, so in hindsight I'm not quite that surprised," Rin remarked. "Even though we say it jokingly, I guess you proved that 'One IS could beat an army.'"

"Actually, they defeated themselves," Sever clarified. "All sh-*yawn* I did was take cover and take them out one by one. Their confusion and panic mixed with high yield explosive weaponry did the rest."

"I see," Rin nodded. "Well, before you fall asleep in your chair, I should finish my story."

Sever nodded and straightened his back in an attempt to focus on the most relevant portion of Rin's story.

"We were worried that Silvario would revive itself into some 3rd form or something, so we decided to have Bodewig take point and fire a rail-gun shot at the 'debris' of the deactivated Silvario. We asked Yamada-sensei for permission, and since we still believed it was an unmanned IS, she allowed it. She said that it would have a 'black box' – an indestructible record of activity of the IS it came from. We watched the projectile explode, then carefully approached the …'wreckage', scanning for that black box. But when we got there, we discovered that – well, there's no delicate way to admit this – we were misinformed of the pilot's status. Instead of being piloted by a drone body, we found out it was actually...her."

Rin bowed low to Sever, tears welling up in her eyes. "I'm so sorry, Sever! I had no idea that Nefe...Natalia was actually the one piloting the out of control IS. Please forgive me!"

"I...I...don't know what to say," Sever answered. Rin looked up at the boy, who kept his face turned away from both her and his sister. "I mean, I'm not quite too sure how to feel about this."

"S-say what?" Rin stuttered in surprise. "I'm admitting to almost killing your sister and you don't know how to feel? Get mad! Get angry! Get sad! Get indignant! Get...something!"

"No matter what you say, I'm not really sure how to act. I'm...more in shock than anything else. I...need to process this for a moment," clarified Sever. "But, I know one thing: I'm relieved that Nef...Natalia is alright."

Rin and Sever stood in silence, not knowing what to make of his statement.

"Have you been with her all this time?" Sever's question broke the silence with an innocent inquiry. Glad for the change in topic, Rin responded, "Mostly. Sometimes Cecilia or the other girls would visit, but it's important that Ichika doesn't get wind of this. He _has _to think that _Silvario Gospel was an unmanned IS_."

"Why is that? Why the conspiracy?" Sever asked, noticing the stress Rin put on the last sentence.

"According to Houki, Ichika took it really bad when he found out that his actions were directly related to the deaths of the recovery team he was sent to intercept. I shudder to think what would happen if he found out that he impaled the sister of his roommate, too."

"...Agreed. He doesn't take kindly to death," Sever remarked with a contemplative look on his face, although Rin did notice that he still avoided looking in Natalia's direction.

"Hey, why don't you get a good look at her? I mean, even if she's unconscious, you really should give her some support or something. Hold her hand," Rin suggested.

"...Right," Sever hesitated, then slowly stretched out his right hand.

DING! "Rin, Sever, it's almost time for class!" Ichika's voice resounded down the hall. As if stricken, Sever's hand shot back to his side and down into his pocket. "Oh no, class is about to start, better get going," he stated as he quickly stepped out of the room.

Rin shook her head in disappointment, then turned to see Natalia wide awake with a worried expression on her face.

"Class rep," she began, "do you see what I'm talking about?"

"Yeah, I do, Nefer-san. But what does it mean? Sure, his personality seems to have changed completely since he revealed his true gender. But, he looks exactly like the Sever I knew for the past year, just without makeup and a boy's uniform."

"Correction, class rep-"

"Rin, what about you?" Ichika yelled to her. Normally, Rin expected Ichika to simply come and retrieve her, but Sever must have stopped him somehow due to her request.

"Uh, I'm assisting one of my sick classmates," Rin replied semi-honestly. "It's one of my responsibilities as class representatives. I'd say to wait up for me, Chifuyu-nee isn't all that lenient, is she? Go on ahead, I'll catch up."

"Oh crap, you're right. Sever, let's go!"

Rin heard the door ding open as Ichika and Sever went to class together.

"As I was saying class rep," continued Natalia, "he looks _similar_ to the Sever you knew. But that man is not my Ate _(pronounced Ah-te, Filipino for big sister). _And judging from the little communique we had earlier, I'm fairly sure that that man is nothing like her, either. That person we just met is a completely different person than my sister."

"How are you so sure? My memory is particular robust, and he looks exactly like he always did save for the uniform and makeup. I don't have any reason to doubt my own memory," Rin countered, unwilling to take the word of the injured girl over her own memories.

"You've met my sister only last year, and not even a full year at that. I've known her for my entire childhood, and I know her better than anyone here. And it doesn't take a detective to see past the similarities and see the differences in personality, in people, between my Ate and that man," Natalia stubbornly declared.

"Differences in personality can be explained by PTSD or some other trauma!" Rin fired back. "Did you know what happened to your sister while you were out fighting us!"

Natalia flinched, unable to reply while Rin was overcome with a severe feeling of guilt for mentioning that fact.

"I'm really sorry," Rin apologized, once again bowing her head low. "I know you were being controlled and that you felt helpless and all, but I can't imagine why you'd deny your brother like that. I mean, I know he pretended to be a girl all this time, even hiding it from you, but he's still family and he probably loves you very much."

"Sever did love me very much," verified Natalia quietly, "but I know that Sever was always a girl. I knew she had secrets she couldn't tell me, but this wasn't one of them."

"You suffered severe mental trauma thanks to those nano-machines, remember?" Rin reminded her classmate. "Maybe you just remembered wrong...it's better than denying your own family."

With a shrug, Rin explained, "My parents are divorced, and the last thing my mother said was that she wished she never met my father. My father said that if they had never met, they wouldn't have had me. My mother...didn't reply and disappeared from my life. She...it seemed like she denied my existence or something, only my father's love and encouragement kept me going. So please, don't treat Sever like my mother treated me. Remember that he's still your only family in the world."

Rin was answered with silence, Natalia evading eye contact. With class beginning soon, Rin decided she couldn't wait for Natalia's answer so she quickly walked to the door.

"I'll think about it."

Without looking back, Rin headed for the elevators with both a smile on her face and tears in her eyes. "Dad," she called out loud in the safety of the empty elevator, "I think I get it now. Why you and Mom split up. But, I still don't understand why Mom left us like that, and why she didn't even look at me. But, you still recognized me. You pushed me to be the best representative for China and even pulled the strings to get me Shenlong. I...I think I can stop crying now. Even on days like yesterday. I...think I can mean it now, Dad."

'"Happy (Belated) Birthday to Me.'"

"Why is it so empty today, Kail?" Ichika asked (fully dressed after replacing his shredded uniform) as they reached the classroom floor and exited the elevator car.

"Mmm, you said it was time for class. Maybe we're tardy and everyone's already seated," reasoned Kail as he bought a coffee from the vending machine near the elevator with his cell.

"No, that can't be right," Ichika verified the time on his cell. "OK, a minute left. But when I went down earlier to change into my uniform the elevators were basically empty. I mean, after I woke up, I realized that others were probably going to be using these same elevators to go up, and I'm basically in just my underwear. I almost died of embarrassment when the doors opened, but luckily only Nohotoke-san was there, and she didn't even seem to notice me. I slipped by without anyone seeing me, but it felt really weird."

"Well, are the girls on our floor usually early?" Kail downed the cup of coffee in a few gulps and purchased another.

"I guess, I find myself usually slipping into class at the last moment, sharing the elevators with the more relaxed upperclassmen. On the few times I get up early enough, I do notice that it's usually us first-years who get up that early in the morning."

"Hmm, I guess that's weird," Kail downed the new cup in a few gulps and bought a third coffee.

"How many credits are left on that thing anyways?" Ichika inquired. "I mean, you bought, like, 15 energy drinks last night, and now three coffees?"

"A good amount, apparently Sever was a rich girl," Kail replied, stacking the three cups and throwing them in the nearby trash bin. "Speaking of energy drinks, I'm really gonna need a bathroom soon, Ichika. Is there one on this floor?"

"Not for us. Usually I just head to the dorm." Ichika glanced at his own cell to read the time. "30 seconds, start walking. But in all honesty I would hold it. Chifuyu-nee's kinda scary when she's in teaching mode. If we get some practicals in, you'll be able to nip by the dorm to let it out."

After a second of thought, Kail announced,"Ugh, fine I'll hold it in. If she's as scary as Sever remembers, I'm better off clamping it shut."

"As Sever remembers? What, you can remember her memories but not her fighting skills?" Ichika teased, referring to Kail's abysmal attempt at partial summoning combat.

"Seriously, that was the first time I got up close and personal like that. You gotta remember I used to be blind," Kail responded dejectedly. "But yeah, it seems like I've inherited her memories, but I can't seem to call them up as if they were my own. I guess I need, like, a prompt or something. Ah, we've arrived."

"Right, Sever," Ichika answered as they walked through the door. As Sever had guessed, all of their classmates in 1A were attending. Even Charlotte and the two other girls from his class who had a case of food poisoning yesterday seemed energetic and well. Of course, in hindsight Ichika probably could have guessed they were OK after talking with Rin, who was also sick.

As expected, Orimura-sensei coldly gave them the evil eye as the two boys took their seats right before Ichika's cell vibrated an alarm in his pocket. Just as always, he had made it to his seat by the slimmest of margins, technically not allowing his sister to give him extra homework for truancy. Of course, had he been truant by even one second...

"Not that we've all assembled," Orimura-sensei began, an icy stare at the two latecomers, "I'd like to inform you of some changes to our syllabus."

All of a sudden, the blackboard behind Orimura-sensei flickered to life, showing the Class 1B on the other side, as if the wall between them was invisible. Ichika noted with a sigh of relief that Rin had made it in time as well, but immediately the room erupted into whispers and comments.

"What's going on? We've never done this before."

"Where's 1B's teacher? Shouldn't we be seeing C and D as well?"

And the like, but Yamada-sensei silenced both classes with a loud shush, aided by the equipping of her Rafael Revive II and an incredibly stern look on her face. This was really out of character for the mild-mannered assistant teacher, although when in an IS Ichika noticed she wasn't really that mild.

"Thank you, Yamada-sensei," Orimura-sensei said as Yamada-sensei dismissed her IS. However, that stern look remained on her face. "As I mentioned, you first-years will have some changes to your syllabus, starting today. Although you will become second years in a couple of months, we've decided to accelerate the schedule and form you into squadrons."

Normally, the girls would've started excitingly whispered amongst themselves, but with the uncharacteristically serious face on Yamada-sensei sweeping over both classes, the girls were too intimidated to gossip.

"The reason for this is simple, right now, we don't have enough Uchigane to ensure everyone gets piloting experience."

"Wait! We all came here to become pilots! What do you mean we don't have Uchigane!" A girl near the middle of the other class exclaimed. Orimura-sensei turned to face the speaker.

"...You are Tokomo-san, right? I'll forgive you once for speaking out of turn since you're not in my class, however, understand that right now I'm in the middle of that very explanation. I will not leave any detail out nor will I reject any questions. But please save them for the _end_ of the announcement, impatient girl."

With an embarrassed glance downward, the girl Tomoko-san sat down quickly, a flush of red spreading over her face.

"If I may continue," Orimura-sensei sarcastically queried, an angry look at the girl through the blackboard monitor, "the reason why we don't have Uchigane is another secret that, if leaked, will be punished under the Alaska Pact."

She turned around to cast her gaze on the Gossip Trio: Nohotoke Honne and her friends. Ichika saw that the two girls he could never seem to remember straightened in their seats to pay better attention and seriousness, but Honne herself had fallen asleep on her desk. Orimura-sensei's eye twitched upon seeing this, but instead of waking her up, she passed over her and simply continued.

"None of you are aware of this, but a severe majority of the ore used to create IS parts – Managem - is mined in the frozen tundra of Russia. We have a non-aggression pact with Russia to exclusively mine and distribute the ore found in these mines, in exchange for devoting time and resources to special technology designed by their own IS researchers.

"However, some entity is attacking and taking control of the mines under our protection, most likely the terrorist group Phantom Task. I'm sure all of you know by now about who they are, but we've uploaded more information about the group and their equipment into our database. Feel free to browse through it at your leisure.

"Even though we are allowed to mine there, Russia has no obligation to protect those mines for us, so we've sent both our second and third years in their squadrons, along with all of the teachers except for Yamada-sensei and I, to intercept and put a halt to the threat to our mines.

"Now, even though the squadrons have already been divided into support and attackers, we still had to send out almost all of our Uchigane, as well as mobilizing the upperclassmen with Personal IS. In addition, the teachers have customized all of the Rafael Revive II we have and customized them for their own fighting style. In the end, in addition to Yamada-sensei's and my custom IS, and the personal IS already distributed to six of our students, we have only three Uchigane left. As such, all of you regular students will learn to become IS mechanics and supporters, while the three highest ranked Uchigane users and the personal IS users will be remain pilots.

That was it: this last statement was the drop of water that spilled over the cup of indignation building up in the students.

The girl directly behind Ichika slammed both her fists down onto her desk, shouting "This isn't why I came to this school! I want to fight and protect my home with the power of IS!" Shouts of agreement and discontent flooded the room, coming from both sides of the blackboard monitor.

SLAM! Orimura-sensei brought her fist down onto the podium in front of her, using so much force that the casing compacted and folded into itself. The loud noise quickly silenced the rampaging girls to a dead quiet. Well, almost: a small snicker escaped from the back of the class, but Ichika dared not to look back to identify the source.

"Ummm, Orimura-sensei? Your hand..." Yamada-sensei started to mention, but Orimura-sensei ignored her and swept her hand backwards. The motion caused small drops of blood to spray from her hand all over the blackboard behind her, but Orimura-sensei didn't dare show any sign of pain.

"And where do you think that power comes from!" she roared in a heat of impatience. "It just doesn't grow on trees! If you'd just think a moment and do the math, you'd realize why we do things like this. There are only 400 or so IS cores in the world, which means there are only that many IS in the world. In addition, about 200 cores have been distributed around the world - each with an assigned pilot - with the 200 remaining in our care. Each year has about 150 students, which is a grand total of some 450 students. As far as the math is concerned, there simply aren't enough cores for each pilot to have an IS!

"That's why we have you first years all train as pilots for a whole year. Normally, we have a final practical which tells us who's better suited to become pilots, but we simply don't have the luxury anymore! If you want to remain pilots, than prove it to me with your scores! Until then, we _will_ be splitting into different roles now, regardless of your own aspirations, until we contain this mess and are able to return to our normal agenda. Is that understood?"

"Yes, Orimura-sensei!" the class responded. Even Nohotoke seemed to have awoken and quickly realized the gravity of the situation, also responding with the class. Ichika noticed one of her friends whispering in her ear, probably trying to fill her in on what's happening. To her credit, it seemed like she was already aware, not even batting a sleepy eye. Guess that's the power of the Gossip Trio's leader: never fazed by the latest scoop.

Orimura-sensei exhaled slowly, trying to regain her calm yet stern tone. "Now, I'd like all of the Uchigane users to remain in the classroom. We've already arranged for one of the mechanics still here to come and give you a quick introduction to the repair bay and the tools they use. As for the top three Uchigane users, we haven't included the data from your partial summoning, so please be patient and obedient towards the mechanic. Her opinion on your understanding of the IS is a big part of what we consider a highly ranked pilot.

"Personal IS users, please go with Yamada-sensei. Except for Orimura and Panganiban." Ichika perked his ears when he heard his sister call for him and his roommate. "Come with me to to my office. We need to have ...a talk. Yes, that's a good way to put it." She flexed her openly bleeding hand, letting drops of blood fall to the ground. Ichika audibly gulped, for whatever reason Chifuyu-nee was extremely aggravated and was probably the angriest he had ever seen her.

Ichika stood up to follow his sister out, then turned back to see if Kail followed suit. Unbelievably, he remained in his seat, an odd defiance in his face. He was deathly focused on something. Following his eyes, Ichika noticed he was staring right at his sister's eyes. No, more like the space right above her head.

Apparently, his sister noticed as well, first turning her eyes to the same spot Kail did, then turning to meet Kail's eyes head on. "Is there a problem with the corner, Panganiban?"

Kail hyperventilated, clearly intimidated by Orimura-sensei's show of aggression. Yet, with great difficulty, he somehow gathered the courage to request "Orimura-sensei, is it possible to remain here, instead?"

Orimura-sensei's eye twitched, a sure sign that her anger was about to peak. She walked slowly towards the boy, somehow making each of her footsteps as imposing as a giant's. She walked right up to him, exhaled loudly, and answered him: "No."

Then she slowly lifted her head. Amazingly, as if hypnotized by her piercing stare, Kail started to rise. His knees cobbled and shook, as if he wanted desperately to stay seated, but it seemed the fear of breaking eye contact with his sister was far more hazardous.

And then Ichika noticed why he was so resistant to moving from his seat. As he attempted to quell his own reaction, he took stock of the room as they realized what he had. The girl next to Kail stifled a familiar-sounding giggle he had last heard after his sister slammed her fist on the console. Nohotoke had reddened to a considerable degree, almost as if she were suffering a fever. Cecilia hid her face behind her handkerchief. Laura hadn't reacted at all, simply waiting for Yamada-sensei to lead the way. Houki...well Houki was caught between feminine decency and teenage curiosity, flip-flopping between totally averting her face and sneaking peeks at the scene.

"Well, I see why you don't want to relocate," Orimura-sensei commented, visibly more serene than she was a moment ago. She turned on her heel and walked to the door.

"I don't want my office to get messy. Change out of your uniform first."

Kail quickly exited through the back door, a wet, sloshing sound with every step.

Shaking his head with a smile, Ichika followed him out. Well, this was far better revenge for the thing this morning than Ichika could have ever dreamed up.

After a quick shower, Ichika and Kail made their way through the empty halls.

"Guess you don't need that bathroom, anymore?" Ichika asked.

"I swear, I will never attempt to hold it in while in a class with that woman ever again," Kail answered, his face still flushed with embarrassment. "Seriously, how do you stand living with her as your sister?"

"Well, she's only scary when she's irritated," Ichika responded. "Once you get to know her, you realize behind that angry face is a person that seriously cares about her students."

"Mmm, I can see what you mean. Sever's memories seem to comply with what you're telling me. It's just, I don't know why she was so aggravated in the first place."

"Wasn't it because of that one girl in Rin's class?"

"No, I noticed she was irritated as soon as we walked into class today."

"Well, we were just seconds from being tardy. Maybe she's just mad at our lack of punctuality."

"You know her better than I do, man. Is she the type to get angry over something like that?"

"Hmmm," Ichika thought for an extended minute before responding, "yes, she would be irritated, but I've never seen her get mad to the point to destroying equipment and disregarding her injuries. Actually, it kind of reminds me of the time I was kidnapped."

"What's that about?"

"A few years ago, when I was in middle school, I was captured by some group in order to make my sister to forfeit a really important IS tournament. With intelligence from the German government, she rescued me. But I remember the look on her face, at least the one before the one she had when she realized I was safe. It was the same as the one she had on when she slammed down on the podium. It was a face of desperation, as if things were going crazy and she had only the slimmest grasp of control."

"So, she felt like she was losing control of the class?"

"Maybe," Ichika agreed. "But she's made of sterner stuff than that. Her stares are usually enough to keep the class from getting too rowdy. I really hope that the combined class announcement was the only thing stressing her out."

"Ah, excuse me," a woman with long pink hair and a white lab coat pushed by the two boys as they walked down the hallway. Ichika felt that this person resembled a certain someone, but he just couldn't think of her.

"No problem, Nebata-sensei," Kail forgave the woman, speaking for the both of Ichika and himself.

With a smile and a nod, Nebata-sensei headed back the way they came, to the classroom where Nohotoke and the other Uchigane users awaited.

"That's Nebata-sensei. She and Sever worked together to work out the kinks in Sever's IS," Kail explained, pointing to his head saying another memory was triggered.

"You remember anything else?" Kail asked, trying to recall exactly where he had seen her face.

"She's really close to your sister. She calls her Chi-chan when she gets excited."

"Geez, that's totally Tabane-san," Ichika realized. "Couldn't she think of a better cover?"

"Well, it makes sense. I mean, IS Academy is protecting you as the first male pilot, they have secret IS mines, and they're keeping Silvario Gospel under wraps. Why wouldn't they also harbor Shinonono Tabane: number one wanted person in the world?" Kail pointed out.

"Another memory got triggered?" Ichika asked, not showing any sign of surprise at the convenience of the recollection.

"Only about Shinonono-san, and they're mostly schoolbook facts and such. A good amount of what Sever actually did in her life is still not clear to me."

"Geez, what's that like? Kinda like knowing a word, but not being able to say it?"

"It's like a pain in the ass," Kail answered. "Seriously, I'm going to be in serious trouble keeping up this identity if I have no idea what kind of personality she showed other people."

"Then, why don't you just 'become yourself'?"

"...I have no clue what you mean."

"Just 'act like yourself'. To be perfectly blunt, that little stunt back there had already shattered the reputation Sever had built up before now," Ichika explained. "You can chalk up a lot of the discrepancies to your behavior to shell shock or PTSD or something like that. And in general, you're a friendly enough person. Just pretend you remember anyone who claims to be your friend, and try to avoid making fun of them. Sever never really did that, and I'm sure the people I've seen you with would appreciate it."

"Well, I guess that's a good place to start. Who have you seen me with?"

"Besides myself and your sister, Nefer, it's Nohotoke and Laura, really. We did hang out with Cecilia, Charlotte, Rin, and Houki once, but I'm not sure about anymore. Do you remember any of the girls?"

"I remember Nefer and Rin, and Shinonono-san's trigger happened during a rather brutal part of yesterday," Kail responded, wincing at the memory of that specific trigger. "As far as Alcott, Dunois, and Bodewig, I know their faces now, but I can't seem to remember what kind of relationship they had with Sever."

"Why do you remember your sister, Rin, and Houki, but not the others?"

"Don't know. I guess I have to spend some time with people to get memories that aren't simply facts and figures. Makes sense, Sever spent time to cultivate those relationships, so I probably have to do the same."

As Kail finished his hypothesis, the two reached Chifuyu-nee's office. Ichika knocked on the door.

"Come in."

Once again, the the found themselves in her office. They immediately took the seats Orimura-sensei offered with a freshly bandaged hand.

"Panganiban," she started, "have you decided what you want to wish for?"

Kail hesitated, "...I know I'm not going to wish for the restoration of my world."

Ichika gasped with surprise, but his sister betrayed no such astonishment.

"In order to restore my world without repercussions, I'm going to need the prana equal to the amount used to destroy it, ultimately dooming this world," Kail explained. "In all honesty, I lied when I said I didn't know what I was going to wish for before. Ever since I made the decision to risk coming to this world, that was my final goal. But retelling the Monkey Paw story reminded me of the inherent problem with any magical tool. No matter what legends are behind it, a tool still requires an input of some sort. Even one like the Holy Grail. If you think about it, it's simply a manifestation of the core tenet of magic: it will make any desire come true.

"But I digress. Ultimately, that wish would simply sacrifice one world for another. And a sacrifice like that wouldn't be one that _she_ would approve of. For now, I guess I just want to have it and make sure no one else uses it."

"...Still an acceptable answer, but not the one I wanted to hear. In addition, who's _she_?" Orimura-sensei mused.

"His girlfriend, Chifuyu-nee. The one in the other...world..." Ichika's explanation trailed off, uncomfortable to finish that sentence.

"It's fine, Ichika. Madoka's gone. But she's always with me in here," Kail beat his breast with a fist, indicating his heart. "No matter how corny that line was."

"Well, I like guys who can say corny lines like that without shame," a new voice came from the doorway.

Ichika and Kail twisted in their seats to look at the newcomers as they opened the door. The voice belonged to a woman about Orimura-sensei's age. She had a sleek face, Japanese features, and her hair was dyed a light purple. Interestingly, she had on colored contacts, making her pupils an odd purple-blue color. Next to her was a giant of a woman, dwarfing the former in comparison and making Orimura-sensei own unnaturally tall height seem normal. Ichika estimated the woman to be 2 meters tall, no, more like 1¾ meters. The taller one had a similar dye job as the former, but more of a lavender than purple. Her face was set with a strong jaw and European features, but the glasses she wore somehow refracted the light so that he couldn't see her eyes clearly. She reminded Ichika of the stern, schoolteacher type he saw in anime. Both women wore business-casual skirt suits, with long pantyhose all the way to their low heels. The taller one carried a clipboard while the shorter one held her hands together girlishly.

"Emiya-san, your timing is impeccable as always," Orimura-sensei remarked as both Ichika and Kail gave up their seats for the newcomers. Orimura-sensei nodded with satisfaction at the chivalry of her two students before continuing, "This is Emiya Sakura-san and her assistant, Ms. Media Ryder. Emiya-san, Ryder-san, this is my brother Ichika and his roommate Sever Panganiban."

Ichika and Kail both blinked in surprise at the name. After all, it was the same family name as the person in Kail's diary. But then again, the most likely reason is it was just pure coincidence. After all, the Orimura Madoka in the diary wasn't related to neither Orimura Chifuyu nor Orimura Ichika. Emiya Sakura probably also had no relation to the Master Emiya Shiro in Kail's diary.

They both shook off their surprise at the coincidence and introduced themselves to the newcomers with a handshake. "Orimura-san, I've already taken care of all the arrangements for the mission. Ryder?"

"Yes, madame," the tall woman curtly responded, handing the clipboard over to Orimura-sensei.

Orimura-sensei flipped through the contents before setting on her desk, "Thank you very much for the information and equipment. That will be all I need from you."

Emiya clapped her hands in pleasure and continued, "That's great. In that case, we'll make our way to your kitchen. Will that be alright?"

"Of course," came Orimura-sensei's reply.

"Well, then. Excuse us, please," Emiya asked, then gently pushed Ichika out of the way to exit the office, Ryder following closely behind.

"What was that about, Chifuyu-nee?" Ichika asked, retaking his seat. Kail closed the door behind the leaving ladies before doing the same. "What mission was Emiya-san talking about?"

Chifuyu sighed deeply. "Ichika, Kail, this is really hard for me to say, but I need for the two of you to be strong."

"What does that mean?" Kail asked.

"You two, along with Laura Bodewig and commanded by Yamada Maya, are hereby ordered to infiltrate a Phantom Task research center. This order cannot be denied due to the authority of the IS Academy Director's Board," she read aloud from the clipboard in front of her, spitting in disgust as she read the last part of the order.

"Wait, what?" Ichika asked incredulously. "I'm sorry, but I don't understand. Why us? Why were we chosen? Why not you and Yamada-sensei?"

"Because the Board is filled with smart, heartless businessmen, Ichika," Orimura-sensei spat out with disgust. "If these problems haven't been cropping up one after another, we wouldn't have to use you this way. Not just you, but those second- and third-years, as well."

"What exactly is wrong, Chifuyu-nee? Tell us! We can help!" Ichika pleaded.

"You shouldn't need to help!" Orimura-sensei countered. "The mining problem should have been handled by the teachers, not the students. But those suits still mobilized the majority of our student body to protect their oh-so-precious mines. I understand that there are more mines than teachers, hence the need for extra forces, but why did they send their forces out so thin? Just because the enemy doesn't use IS doesn't mean you should underestimate them and only send three per mine!"

"But Chifuyu-nee, the IS AD protects the pilots from all damage until it runs out. Small fire and even munitions won't be enough to beat an IS, much less 3 of them at once," Ichika returned.

"Pride goes before a fall, Ichika," Orimura-sensei reminded him. "Weapons technology is evolving more and more, especially since IS is recognized as the strongest weapon in existence. As long as those mines are in operation, we can control both the creation of IS parts and IS economy in the world. The Board wants to kill to birds with one stone, both protecting the mines and proving to the world that IS is the new military power with one quick blitzkrieg."

"Why would they want to even attempt such a thing? In chess, a blitzkrieg is a dangerous opening gambit that leaves you defenseless if it fails," Ichika pointed out.

"It stems to a certain incident, that happened a few days back, involving a single damaged IS and the demolition of a small Hawaiian island," Orimura-sensei answered. "Somehow, they got the idea that if one personal IS was able to demolish a group of professionally trained mercenaries with heavy arms, a trio of IS per mine would be more than sufficient to suppress the guerrilla tactics being used.

"Look, I'm getting off track, Yamada-sensei will be finished with the mission briefing soon, so I better continue."

Orimura-sensei goaded the two now nervous boys to approach the desk and look at the clipboard she set down. She flipped to the second page, a map of a group of islands labeled "Northern Mariana Islands", off the coast of Guam. There was a satellite photo taped to the empty area of the map, with an arrow pointing at one of the islands in particular. The photo was of an overhead view of a large building the basically encompassed the entire island. It was designed in the shape of a huge cross, with a glass ceiling or dome at the intersection. According to the scale, the island itself was like a 500 square meter plateau rising out of the ocean, its shore completely made up of rocky crags.

"This building, modeled after Catholic cathedrals, used to be the home of a certain eccentric billionaire about 50 years ago. However, due to it being right over the Mariana Trench, vents of natural gas had forced the occupants to vacate.

"A short time ago, American pilot Elly Shivers and her IS Fang Quake had flown out to do its annual appraisal of the island. About one mile from reaching the shore, the systems on her IS halted and she fell out of the sky. Currently, she is being treated at the field hospital in Guam, and is in serious danger of flat-lining until proper medical care can be provided.

"But wait, shouldn't the AD protect the pilot from even impact damage like the splashdown?" Ichika asked, but deep in his heart he knew the answer. It's the only reason why his sister would even mention this little detail.

"The AD had completely failed. Luckily, she was cruising at low attitude, but the momentum she had and the extra weight of the IS combined caused the serious injuries upon splashdown. I received pictures, but I refuse to show either of you them."

"What does this have to do with us?" Kail spoke up.

"Obviously, we are going to investigate the island," Ichika declared, starting to get pumped with excitement.

"That's correct," Orimura-sensei admitted, bit with a bit of depression in her voice.

"What's wrong, Chifuyu-nee?" Ichika asked, noticing her unusual tone. "Isn't this just simple exploration?"

"It's never that simple, Ichika," Orimura-sensei shook her head sadly. "This is normally top secret information, technically only America should have this information. We received this information at great risk to our informant, Emiya-san. The other side to this matter is that America will be sending a squad of soldiers to do the same. It's imperative that we learn what the source of the IS neutralization is and either recover it or destroy it before the Americans. That's an order from the Board."

"Why is it so important?"

"The same reason why we sent so many of our people to the mines, Ichika. This neutralizing effect is a serious threat to IS. If America were to weaponize it, the world's balance of power could be thrown off, especially with their tendency to go on 'Crusades of Justice'."

"But aren't they allies, or something like that?"

"At the very least we have a mutual relationship, but something that can completely neutralize IS is something the Board doesn't want anyone to have, including our 'allies'. As I said, they are smart, heartless businessmen," Orimura-sensei concluded. "Mission details will be given to you by Yamada-sensei. Are there any questions?"

"Why just us four?" Ichika asked. "Why aren't you and the rest of the girls going?"

"As I said, there's an IS negating effect on the island, which means I can only send people with experience fighting without IS. That narrows it down to you, Panganiban, Bodewig, Shinonono, Yamada-sensei, and myself. The Board won't allow both of us to go, so Yamada-sensei was selected so she can provide support and direction. As for Shinonono, the weight limit of the craft is dangerously close to overcapacity. The Board decided to have Shinonono remain here due to the fact that on paper, Panganiban seems to have more practical combat experience."

"Wait, what? I never heard of this," Kail complained. "She can take my place."

"That's unacceptable, Kail," Orimura-sensei retorted, referring to him by his real name. "The decision is final. You absolutely have to go. As long as you are 'Sever Panganiban', you are a student of this Academy and thus are obligated to carry out this mission, as much as it pains me to admit."

"But, I'm not like Sever," Kail protested. "I'm not a former assassin or a free runner or some awesome IS pilot. I'm just a support mage. I don't have any combat ability whatsoever."

"I know, you don't have an aggressive bone in your body, you liability," Orimura-sensei's voice took on the same tone as when she spoke about the Board earlier. "If I had the authority I would remove you from the mission, but I can't do that without revealing your identity as not the real Sever. Can I really do that without compromising your preparations for the Grail War?"

Kail shook his head, "No, I still need some time and the protection of the Academy."

"Well, now is the time to pay up for that time and protection. You will have to just make due with the skills you have right now," Orimura-sensei shot back. "But I want you to know, if Sever was here, I would have a lot more confidence in the success of this mission. You are the wild card in this mission, Kail. With your powers as a mage, you could make up for your combat deficiencies and take on a forward support role, but I have no idea what your normal skills will enable you to do."

"Chifuyu-nee, lay off him a bit, he's not taking this well," Ichika noticed, defending his friend. Kail had gazed downward, furrowed eyebrows told Ichika that Kail was deep in thought about what he could do. "He's doing his best to adjust. It's only been two days since he fled his world."

"I can't be as understanding as you, Ichika," Orimura-sensei stated disappointingly. "I have the responsibility of protecting the students of this Academy, even more so now because I and Yamada-sensei are the only teachers left. And even though it's one of your good qualities, you can't be so understanding to everyone you meet, either. Kail's performance could decide the success of the operation. Without the use of IS, failure to secure the target would also mean capture or even death."

"...I'm aware of this, Chifuyu-nee, but Kail's not the only one with a few new tricks." Ichika grabbed a stiff, 100 yen coin he had in his pocket. He focused on the feeling he had this morning, the feeling of Reinforcing his hand. A pale silver aura again surrounded his arm. Using his gut instinct to gauge the od he'd need for this operation, he folded over and crushed the coin multiple times in front of Orimura-sensei's bewildered eyes.

"Ichika, when? How?" Orimura-sensei sputtered in surprise.

"I've been having this guy teach me," Ichika thumbed over to the now smiling Kail.

"You learned that way too fast, man. You might just have the knack for this," Kail commented. Ichika smiled with pride at his words. "Tell me, how did you know how much od to use?"

"I used my feelings and instinct."

"...I see. Alright, keep practicing that whenever you get a chance. Also, try Reinforcing other objects as well. See if you can cultivate an instinct for other things besides your body. This is Reinforcement as its meant to be used. As for the amount you should use, well, you'll find out as you practice."

"Sounds like fun, Kail," Ichika said gratefully as he received his new magical training assignment.

Suddenly, the sound of a phone ringing echoed from Orimura-sensei's pocket. She greeted the caller with a curt "This is Orimura," then concluded the call with an equally curt "Understood, arriving in five."

"That was Yamada-sensei," she reported to the two boys. "She's finished telling the others what I just told you. I need to remind the two of you that only we and the girls Yamada-sensei took with her are privy to this mission. This is to be kept on a strict need-to-know basis. It would send the students into a fit if they found out the Board was sending out other students into battle without IS."

"Understood," the two boys said, before getting up to leave.

"Ichika, one moment. I need to talk to you. Panganiban, please go on ahead," Orimura-sensei interjected. "I need to talk to Ichika."

"Oh, that's not a problem, unless it's private," Kail mentioned. "Actually, I have to tell you something as well. I can wait."

"That will be fine," Orimura-sensei acquiesced. "Ichika, I have something to give you: our family's ancestral sword: Yukihira."

She turned in her chair to carefully unlock and open the sword case behind her.

"Isn't that your IS melee weapon, Ichika?" Kail asked.

"Well, my Yukihira II is based off Chifuyu-nee's Yukihira back when she was a Mondo Grasso contender," Ichika answered. "That Yukihira was designed to have the same feel and balance as this Yukihira, the sword traditionally passed down in our family. I've never seen it myself, but apparently it's perfect for my sword style: Iaido."

Click! Orimura-sensei had retrieved the sword in question, gently laying it into Ichika's outstretched hands.

"What is this?" Ichika inquired with disdain.

"Our ancestral sword, Yukihira. The mysterious sword given to the current head of the Orimura family," Orimura-sensei explained.

"It's a metal bokken," Ichika stated, clearly expecting something more extravagant.

"It's perfect for you, wouldn't you agree?" Kail pointed out, showing no sign of surprise nor disgust by the revelation.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, as far as Reinforcement is concerned, it's easier to perform on a blunt instrument rather than a sharp one. Not only that, but since it lacks edges, it can't kill inadvertently."

"It can still kill, though," Ichika pointed out disparingly.

"I've seen you practice, Ichika. You are sufficiently skilled to control that sword even without an IS," Orimura-sensei encouraged. "Just remember: the focus of this Yukihira is 'Impact', not 'Penetration' like Yukihira II's. Aim to smash, not to pierce or cut."

"Right, Chifuyu-nee. I'll treat it well," Ichika accepted the gift gratefully.

"Now, Panganiban, what did you need to say?" Orimura-sensei turned to the other boy.

"Just this," And with slight gasp of pain, he wrenched off the emblem fused to his right hand. Ichika gasped as he cleaned the blood off of the trinket with his uniform. He set the dull bronze but blood-free IS inactive form on the desk.

"I'll do it, Orimura-sensei. I'll use magic to help make this mission succeed. As long as I do it covertly, no one will realize that I am a mage. However, in addition, I still need to be Sever for a little while longer. So please, fix that IS and help me at least become a little more competent."

Orimura-sensei smiled an evil smile. "That's...possible."

Kail and Ichika exchanged glances after hearing that ominous statement. Kail gave Ichika a worried glance that screamed, "What did I get myself into?" Ichika smirked, silently replying, "You did want this."

"Alright, Yamada-sensei is waiting for the two of you by the dock for the actual mission briefing and equipment familiarity. Mission starts at 1200. Panganiban, I will have Nebata repair this as soon as possible. Report back here afterward for... a special lesson." Again, Orimura-sensei smiled that dark, devilish smile.

"Yes, Orimura-sensei!" Ichika and Kail saluted, although Kail's reply wasn't as crisp as Ichika's. Or clear. Or audible, really. It really felt like his sister had something against the guy, but then again, she also really enjoyed her own personal flavor of teaching. Maybe this a fusion of the two; Ichika was interested to see what kind of training his sister had in store for him.


	5. Ch 4 Making Necessary Precautions

Chapter 4 – Making Necessary Precautions on Multiple Fronts

Disclaimer: Infinite Stratos and the Fate universe belong to the original creators. Any use of them is strictly for non-profitable and non-derogatory purposes, covered under the Fair Use Act.

* * *

><p><strong>June 10, after the Orimura-sensei's informal briefing of the mission<strong>

"So what did you think about Emiya-san and Ryder-san?" Ichika asked, twisting his new metal bokken in his hand trying to get a feel for its weight.

"Coincidences happen, man," Kail answered, visually inspecting Ichika's new weapon. "It's just a name. Doesn't mean she's related to anyone I knew. If I didn't realize this as soon as I came to this world, I probably would've kissed your sister as soon as I first heard her."

Ichika jumped back in surprise. "What do you mean by that? Aren't you scared of her?"

Kail shuddered involuntarily at the thought. "Indubitably," he admitted, "But when I first heard her voice, I thought a grown-up Madoka was talking to me. I wonder if Madoka looked like her when she was younger..." He stared up into the sky, undoubtedly trying to imagine what his girlfriend looked like. As for Ichika, he couldn't even imagine what his sister looked like at his age, she had always seemed so mature and grown-up to him.

"But yeah, Orimura-sensei is Orimura-sensei no matter how alike they sounded, and Madoka is dead anyways. So, yeah..." Kail's explanation trailed off. No matter how true it was, the fact that he was the lone survivor of his world weighed heavily on his mind.

"Maybe we should talk about something else," Ichika attempted to change the subject. "Alright, so Emiya-san's name is just a coincidence, but what do you think they're doing here?"

"Well," Kail drawled, recalling what the two had talked about with Orimura-sensei, "She mentioned something about preparing everything for the mission, then asked to use the kitchen."

"She's the new chef!" Ichika declared triumphantly. Kail stopped, slowly turned to him, and raised a questioning eyebrow. And then gave Ichika a half smile. "Maybe she's a conventional arms merchant or something like that. After all, the weaponry and equipment we have here are meant for IS to use. Maybe Chifuyu-nee called in a few favors," Ichika continued, completely ignoring his lame joke from earlier.

"You're accusing your sister of black market dealings?" Kail asked skeptically. Ichika was about to protest, but then imagined his sister as the head of some military force; leading the men and women in the aggressive, authoritative tone of hers. He imagined her in military fatigues and face paint, wielding a rocket launcher in one hand and the original Yukihira resting against her shoulder, marching double time leaving a trail of destroyed cities in her wake.

"You know, I know I should deny that," Ichika started to say, "but the more I imagine it, the more I feel like it could be true."

Kail thought for a second, than shuddered again, adding, "Even though she has an IS and I've seen firsthand how powerful she is in it, I find the image I just imagined to be a hell of a lot scarier."

"Did you just imagine military fatigues, heavy ordinance and demolished cities?"

"...Ok, that's eerie. Get out of my head!" Kail elbowed Ichika playfully.

CLANG! CLANG! Ichika dropped his metal bokken with a clatter, than cradled his arm tenderly.

"..And that wasn't meant to happen," Kail added unnecessarily.

"You just hit my funny bone," Ichika groaned, "I really hate this numb feeling, man."

"Sorry." Kail bent down to pick up the bokken in apology. He started to hand it over to Ichika when a thought struck him: "What is this made out of anyways?"

Still rubbing feeling back into his arm, Ichika asked, "What do you mean?"

Kail hefted it in his arm like a training weight. "The thing weighs like a kilogram or so."

"Well, yeah," Ichika agreed. "Normal iaito, when properly made, weigh about the same weight as that guy. Hmm, maybe a little less, but I haven't held a human sword since enrolling."

"But a normal sword is pretty thin, right?"

"Yea, about this thin." Ichika held up his fingers about half a centimeter apart.

"You don't see a problem yet?" Kail pressed. He pressed the blunt edge of the metal bokken against the space made by Ichika's fingers.

"I _did_ call it a metal bokken, Kail," Ichika reminded him tiredly. "It's shaped like a normal bokken, so it's a metal bokken. If it was shaped like a suburito, I'd call it a metal suburito."

"I don't care about the name, I want to know what it's made of."

Ichika took a very close look at the bokken, close enough to see his reflection within the smoother areas. There were scratches all over, probably due to the use it had seen throughout its whole life, but there was not one speck of rust on it.

"I'd say very well-maintained Japanese steel," Ichika answered, unsure of what his roommate was getting at.

"If that's right, then I'm even more confused," Kail looked at the weapon closely with inquisitive eyes.

"It's a weapon with a grip I'm used to, an edge that can't accidentally injure (as you mentioned), and made of something tough enough to endure both time and use. I really don't see a problem."

"And it weighs less than it should."

_Well, that's a bit confusing,_ Ichika thought. "How so?"

"Well, how much does a normal bokuto weigh?"

"Half a kilo, a tad more."

"Then if this is the same shape as a bokuto, but completely made out of metal, it should weigh 2 and a half. Steel is about 5 times heavier than wood, so where are the other 1 and a half kilos?" Kail explained.

"Maybe it's hollow?"

"Doubtful, it would've dinged up really bad when you dropped it. It would've probably made a hollower sound, too. But just in case..."

Kail braced the middle of the bokuto on his leg and tried to bend the weapon with all of his strength. But the bokuto didn't bend even one degree.

"Yeah, this things definitely solid, and it's insanely stiff, too. Hey, do you mind if I Analyze it?"

Ichika's expression changed from confusion to excitement. "Another one of your Deviant skills?"

"Yes and no, the people who trained under Master Shiro could also do it, so I wouldn't call it Deviant. But I do perform it differently than everyone else, even from the Master. Ahh, but I should probably tell you, I don't think you'd be able to learn it the way I do."

Ichika pouted, "Why not?"

"You said you 'used your instincts' or something, right? Honestly, I was hoping to hear you say something like ' a voice told me' or ' a voice told me to stop'."

"I'm supposed to hear voices when I perform magic?" Ichika asked sarcastically. "Whose voice is it supposed to be? We were the only ones up there on the roof and you were unconscious. Was it my voice I was supposed to hear?"

"Yes, in a matter of speaking," Kail answered seriously.

"Say what?"

"See, when I 'Analyze' something, I form a connection with the object in question. You see, everything in the world has...not really a soul, but some form of sentience. Usually, this sentience is limited to simple thoughts: 'What am I?' and 'How do I stay this way?'

"You remember the first time I used my powers, right? After I failed the summon spell the first time -Ugh, that feels horrible to say- I simply Analyzed the room, read everything's answer to 'What am I?', then used Alteration to return everything back to that state."

"Is Analyze the huge grid I saw for a split second?" Ichika wondered.

"Exactly, but normally you wouldn't see the grid itself. Mmmm, the explanation is quite long and technical, but simply put, if I need to Analyze a lot of things or the thing I want to Analyze is large, and time is limited, I'll use so much prana that reality will warp and normal people will see the range of the skill," Kail explained. "Let me show you what I mean."

He placed his hand on a floorboard and muttered "Trace on."

"I just Analyzed the single piece of wood. I didn't read too deeply into what it was, but is basically a few pieces of wood laminated together with the topmost layer stained to look dark and varnished to protect the stain," Kail described the floorboard. "This is about how much I usually gleam from normal objects: its basic form and superficial characteristics. Now, pay attention to this."

Once again, Kail put his hand on the ground on the same floorboard and muttered, "Trace on." Ichika watched as for a split second that same grid appeared on every floorboard, the walls, the ceilings, and the doors of the hallway they were in within a 1 meter radius.

"Each floorboard is joined to the next via interlocking planks and adhesive. In a addition, the one directly to the left of your left foot is slight cracked. I bet it squeaks when someone steps on it."

With a boast like that, Ichika couldn't help but try it out. He rubbed his foot up and down the board in question, and almost right in the middle, he found a spot that made a weird sound that got louder as he put more weight on it.

With a satisfied smile, Kail continued, "The walls are by sandwiching steel supports with two panels of plaster, covered by a thin layer of paint. Every 45 cm or so there's another steel support except for around doors. There's some kind of Styrofoam between the two panels, preventing heat transfer between rooms. The door is made similarly to the floorboards, but with more layers and a lighter stain. The ceiling is made of mostly concrete, with steel supports reinforcing the floor. I could continue, but you probably see the gist of it."

"Impressive. So, by combining this with Alteration, you can pretty much repair anything?" Ichika summarized.

"And if you add in Augmentation, I can make the new part stronger. In short, it's how I was able to maintain Madoka's IS even though I didn't have the required skill set."

"So, if this is something only you can do, what about the others? What do they do that's different?" Ichika pressed.

Kail shrugged, "I can't really tell you because I learned a different way. You can use your od to read the structure of things pretty easily, but Alteration relies on being able to communicate with the sentience of an object. Same with Augmentation. But for you, it's best if we focus on Reinforcement, both on yourself and other objects. Like I said, you have a real knack for it."

Ichika frowned, "Bleh, fine. I suppose I should practice what I know a little more before I try something new. So, what were we talking about?"

Kail smiled back, "This thing. Mind if I Analyze it?"

"Go right ahead," Ichika answered. "But why ask?"

Kail gave him a worried smile. "Other people's possessions are special. You see, if someone cares about something enough, the object's sentience becomes more and more complex. You know those Noble Phantasms I mentioned? Those things are so treasured they develop their own wills. They will actively resist my form of Analysis. But then, if its owner gives their permission, I can usually gather any information I want from it. And usually, it knows a lot more than 'What am I?'"

With a nod toward Ichika, Kail gripped the hilt of the bokuto solidly, than placed his other hand over it. Unlike the first few times he Analyzed something, Kail seemed to hesitate. His hand hovered, trembling uncontrollably.

"What are you waiting for? You have my permission, remember?" Ichika reminded him.

"R-right..." Kail grabbed the blade of the bokuto with a firm grip. He took a few deep breaths to steady himself, then muttered with a slight stammer, "T-trace on."

Immediately, Ichika saw that grid appear once again on the bokuto. But immediately after it appeared on the weapon, it suddenly appeared on Kail himself. He released his grip, allowing the metal bokuto to fall to the ground with a clatter. He fell to the ground beside it, curling into a fetal position cradled around his right arm. His teeth chattered like crazy and his pupils rolled back into his eyelids, almost as if Kail was having a seizure. Ichika debated whether he should stick something into Kail's mouth, but then something decidedly abnormal happened. Right before his eyes, Kail's skin started to lighten, all the way to a pure white, then somehow even lighter to a pale translucence. Then, through the glass-like skin, once again he saw the odd pattern of red lines he saw once before.

Frozen with shock, he watched as the twitching Kail's skin turned ever more clear, exposing more and more of the pattern underneath. On a canvas of gray skin, Ichika saw circles and spikes of black underneath those initial lines of red. Ichika tried to focus on a specific design, but suddenly Kail's skin returned to its normal color and hid the odd design underneath it. He slowly uncurled his body and got back up, just as Ichika's body unfroze itself. Ichika rushed to assist his friend, asking "Are you OK?"

"Yeah, yeah," Kail answered back in a whisper. "Let me just catch my breath."

Ichika noticed that Kail's attention was focused on his right arm, glowing with purple light as the lines of his magic circuit dimly illuminated the hall. In a few tense seconds, Kail somehow repressed the light from his arm, returning it to how it normally looked.

"What happened?" Ichika asked nervously.

"Mana feedback," Kail answered with a grimace. "That guy rejected me, quite violently I might add." He pointed at the metal bokuto at their feet. "As soon as I tried to connect to it, it disrupted my mana control, causing my od to flow back into me."

"Is that why your arm was glowing?" Ichika asked.

"Yeah, remember the valve anecdote? It's like this: I wanted to use a very tiny dribble of od to analyze it, but the bokuto forced it open all the way, then tried to force what came out back into my arm. Quite painful."

"I bet. Will you be ok?" Ichika asked.

"Yes."

"Good. So, what was with the red and -"

"What are you two still doing here?" An irritated Orimura-sensei appeared out of nowhere. "Yamada-sensei contacted me asking how much longer I was going to keep you."

"Sorry, about that, Chifuyu-nee, we'll be going now," Ichika hurriedly excused himself, retrieved his bokken from the floor and started half-dragging Kail to the meeting place.

"And don't call me Chifuyu-nee at school!" Orimura-sensei loudly muttered after them, the echo bouncing off the walls in the silent, narrow hallway.

Just as the two turned the corner, they almost ran into Ms. Ryder. They would have collided if not for the slight side-step she made to barely avoid contact. Ichika looked back to see Ms. Ryder smile gently after them before turning the corner herself.

"By the way, Ichika," Kail spoke up, slipping out of Ichika's grip and easily keeping pace beside him. "How are you going to hold that thing during the mission?"

"Took you two long enough, and where's your blazer?" Houki muttered as Ichika finally showed up at the dock where she, Yamada-sensei, and the others waited. Houki impatiently tapped her foot as she waited for Ichika to catch his breath. She attempted to ignore the existence of the man beside him.

"Sorry, we had some last minute things to take care of, like make a holder and grip for this thing," Ichika explained, pointing a thumb behind him. Houki looked over the shoulder Ichika was pointing at and noticed a taped handle sticking out over his right side. She moved to take a better look, but Cecilia cut her off to take a better look at it.

"It's a metal stick!" she exclaimed. Then, with a slight bit of disdain, she added, "What a crude weapon to be wielding, Ichika-san!"

"It's not a stick, Cecilia, it's a bokken. Well, a metal bokken, but a weapon nonetheless," Ichika explained, drawing it from the makeshift sheath on his back. Everyone gathered around Ichika to look at it in more detail. As Ichika said, it was quite literally a bokken made out of metal, with a grip that looked to be made of the same material as the school uniform's blazer. With that observation, Houki took a quick glance at the sheath Ichika had made. It seemed to also be made out of the same material, but Houki was puzzled by the way it seemed to have been stitched together. She knew Ichika had no ability in the skill, so she wondered who among them would be able to do it for him in that short amount of time. The answer should have been obvious, if it not for the fact she was actively trying to ignore him.

"But I seriously expected it to be a bit more intimidating, myself. At least something with an edge, you know?" Ichika added with a touch of disappointment.

"But, I think it's a good fit for you, Ichika," Rin piped in. "Even back in our school days, you were always practicing with that practice sword of yours. I think for a mission like this, having a more durable form of a weapon you're used to is more suitable than wielding the Song Zhanmadao or...what's a Japanese sword... the Masamune."

"I hate to say it, but I agree," Houki opined, "I've sparred the most with you, and I'm aware how important it is to use weapons you are used to."

"But, that's not exactly the weapon he's used to, Shinonono," Laura countered. "First of all, Ichika's had no practical experience with using that weapon itself, and secondly, it's made of a completely different material than the weapon it's based off of. It has to be a great deal heavier than a normal 'bokken'," she sounded out the unfamiliar term.

"A girl after my own heart," Sever spoke up, unknowingly but easily breaking Houki's attempted ignorance. "That's almost the same thing I said when I first held it."

"Then why don't you claim her and get rid of one of my rivals," Charlotte darkly muttered under her breath. A shadow of the face Charlotte wore at the beach resort after Houki's almost-kiss flashed across her face, causing Houki to flinch back in fearful surprise. That was a dream/nightmare she did not need to be reminded of.

"Houki, what's wrong?" Ichika asked in concern. He sheathed the weapon unto his back and looked into Houki's eyes. His eyes were wide open, searching for any trauma on his childhood friend with an intense stare. With a wave of self-consciousness enveloping her, Houki turned away from his gaze. She could feel the fires of blushing fill her cheeks as she stammered, "Nothing, nothing, I swear. Umm... we have that mission. Do you understand what you have to do?"

Ichika sighed in relief after hearing her false reassurance and restated the goals of the mission in an almost mechanic manner. Houki felt both gratitude that Ichika had dropped the issue instantaneously, but a bit annoyed that he couldn't see that she actually wanted him to dote on her a bit more.

"I'm glad to hear that, Orimura-san," Yamada-sensei said. "In that case, we'll be going over the equipment you'll be using in addition to your IS, as well as the role each piece will have in the mission. Finally, we'll have a brief summary of the"

"Wait, we'll still be taking our IS?" Ichika asked.

"Yes, after you knock out the source of the IS jamming, you should use your IS to flee as fast as possible."

"But wouldn't that just give away our involvement in this mission? I thought this was strictly Black Ops," Laura pointed out.

"It was something Orimura-sensei fought for when the Board asked for our compliance. She demanded that once the objective was fulfilled we would vacate as soon as possible with all resources at our disposal," Yamada-sensei explained with a wistful awe in her voice. "While we complete the mission, the Board will come up with any diplomatic response necessary should the need arise."

Laura nodded in understanding, allowing Yamada-sensei to continue the briefing.

"Now, the ship in front of us is called a pelican, kindly lent to us by Emiya-san, whom you've met," she explained. It was about the size of a small commercial jet but with a larger fuselage. It also had a loading bay out the back rather than a loading door in the side, as well as large buoys off of the wing to help stabilized it while in the water. It was colored a dark blue on top and a lighter blue everywhere else. It was rather garish in the daylight but Houki noticed that the top matched the dark blue water well, while the bottom was close to that of the sky. "It's a sea-faring plane meant to carry personnel and sensor equipment. The top has been camouflaged to avoid detecting from satellites when flying over water, and it's equipped with a radar jammer that will disguise our position outside of 500 meters. Anymore and the power supply needed would be so heavy that we could only carry the pilot and just one of you three, in addition to the other equipment necessary for the mission.

"Now, the first part of the mission is actually getting to the Island. Luckily for us, the route takes us right over the wreckage from the Silvario Gospel Incident." There was a murmur as the group assembled remembered their first mission they risked their lives to complete. Houki noticed a subtle nod between Rin and Sever. She must have told him about Natalia.

"Shinonono-san, Alcott-san, Dunois-san, Huang-san, your role in this mission is minimal: escort the pelican to the designated area in a tight formation with us in the middle."

"Why do you need an escort if the pelican is protected from both satellites and radar?" Cecilia had brought up a good point. "Not only that, a group of armed IS flying to a location of a previous battle currently occupied by the US, while they are simultaneously launching their own Black Ops mission on a nearby island."

"All good points, but you must remember that it's only been a couple of days since the incident," Yamada-sensei patiently explained. "They haven't actually exercised their right to occupy the space just yet, which means that we have a diplomatic avenue of reason to use should America raise a fuss. What we actually need the escort for is tricking the Navy ship currently on patrol near the Island the research center is on."

She pulled out the clipboard that Ms. Ryder had dropped by to give to her earlier and flipped it to a map showing the location of the Incident's wreckage and the route that the Navy vessel was taking. She pointed to the X on the route, saying, "This is where we estimate the ship to be when we arrive, about a kilometer from the wreckage. You'll remember that the jammer fails within 500 meters of the sensor, so we'll use the IS to camouflage the radar on-board the ship. If you stick to the pelican close enough, it should be enough to trick the radar operator into thinking it's just a squadron of IS. If they try to visually confirm directly with binoculars or some such, we can actively change the outside colors to match the sky and camouflage ourselves that way. It will be especially effective if one of you obscures their view by placing yourself between us and the ship. Once we pass the ship, occupy the wreckage area, referring all communication attempts back to the Academy. Orimura-sensei and the Board will take care of it, you four just make sure to obey their instructions. Do you understand?"

"We understand," Houki and the rest said together.

"In that case, you four are dismissed." Yamada-sensei turned to address Ichika, Sever, and Laura for the rest of the mission details when Charlotte spoke up.

"We'd like to attend the rest of the briefing, Sensei." She a mature air about her, a confident aura that didn't exactly infer she was worried about anything. It was more like she wanted to know as much as possible so that she could help in any way she could. It was a feeling Houki not only empathized with but agreed with. And it seemed as the others agreed as well, as the four stubbornly refused Yamada-sensei's dismissal. With a gentle smile, she nodded her affirmation, but did not confirm nor deny their request. Although it was a military-like mission, it was still a fact that the Academy was still a school and thus not as strict as the military would be with its soldiers. Ichika and his group moved to make room for the displaced girls.

"Now, after we detach ourselves from the IS unit, we will be flying for about 3 hours under radio silence until we reach here," she explained, flipping to the next page and pointing to an X about 500 meters away from the island the mission objective was on. "You three will travel the remaining distance to the island on these."

Yamada-sensei moved over to the back of the pelican and opened the cargo bay door with an external button. Inside were three of those aquatic machines divers used to get around quickly underwater, alongside scuba gear and air re-breathers.

"Ms. Bodewig, I believe you know how to operate these?" Yamada-sensei asked for confirmation.

Laura nodded her affirmation.

"Then during the 3 hour trip I would like for you to teach Orimura-san and Mr. Panganiban about their use as well as the signals you'll need to stay in communication. While in the water, assume that all ships are equipped with sonar and respond appropriately.

"After making landfall, you three will infiltrate the complex, searching for the IS inhibitor. As you stated before Orimura-san, your goal is to either recover or destroy it, whichever is more pragmatic. Should you choose to destroy it, gather as much data as you can so that we can recreate it here."

"If we need to destroy it, we should disable it first and then use our IS to do so, correct?" Ichika asked. "What if we are unable to disable it and we still need to destroy it?"

Yamada-sensei gave him a grim frown. "If that is the case, then we'll use those: our last resort." She pointed to three backpacks securely attached to the inside of the plane. "Inside each of those is what's known as a Liquid Stream, an experimental weapon for IS sized down for humans to use. It's meant to be used for fire-fighting, but we've re-purposed it for that specific possibility. We've filled it with a corrosive liquid that you can use to cut a hole in relatively anything. Of course, it's very dangerous, which is why we called it a 'last resort'. I'll show you how to use it just in case, but I insist you do anything in your power to avoid its use.

"Once I've confirmed either the recovery or the destruction of the device, we will vacate the island and make our way back to the Academy, again under radio silence. Once we've returned safely, orders to return will be given to our escort as well. Any questions?"

"Will we have any other equipment, for example, communications? Are we allowed to bring our own?" Laura asked.

"Do you plan to split up?"

"If necessary, yes."

With a frown, Yamada-sensei admitted, "I can provide Jawbone headsets, however you won't be able to use them until you make landfall. Unfortunately, I have no way to encrypt transmissions between headsets, so be careful what you tell each other. I'd still rather you three not separate, but if the situation changes, at least you can remain in contact.

"As far as your personal equipment, if you feel like you need more than what we've provided you, please do so, however I will have final say in what is brought on board the pelican. Keep in mind that not only is the mission covert, but we may have to fight trained professionals. While all of you are strong in non-IS combat, I would rather you avoid confrontations with either the US or the Phantom Task operatives."

"Operatives?" Sever echoed. "I was under the impression that the facility was evacuated due to the natural gas leaks all around the castle."

"So were we, until Ms. Ryder gave me the new information just now," Yamada-sensei shook her head in dismay. She flipped to the very last photograph, a grainy enlargement of a satellite picture showing what looked to be a cargo ship unloading supplies onto a short wharf on the island. The time stamp on the photo showed that it had been less than an hour since the photo was taken.

"Assuming we still have the jump on the US, we have no choice but to assume that the Island is now occupied. Most likely, Phantom Task researchers and mercenaries they hired to protect themselves with. Even with this new information, the Board still decided to proceed with the mission."

Yamada-sensei glanced at her watch. "You know the details of the mission. It's about 0930 hours, mission starts at 1200. meet back here at the pelican at 1145, and make sure you get some lunch before we leave. Dismissed!" Yamada-sensei quickly left for her office, probably to work out the final details and get the headsets ready.

"Ichika, Panganiban, follow me," Laura ordered. "We should get together and decide how we three will move as a unit."

"Hey wait!" Cecilia shouted. "Why does Ichika have to go with you right now? You'll have three hours to do that kind of planning. We need some time with him ourselves!"

"Right, right!" Rin added. "We won't be able to support him directly, so we should do what we can here and now!"

"So I'll go take care of lunch, be there at 1045!" Cecilia volunteered, and quickly made her way to the cafeteria.

….

"...ka..ello...Ichika...Hello?" Sever was messing with Ichika's cheekbones trying to get him conscious. With an aching head, Houki recovered from the brief fainting spell the thought of Cecilia's cooking had forced upon her. Luckily enough, he had never been subjected to the torture Cecilia could wreak upon otherwise decent cuisine, and so had not fainted with the rest of them.

"Oh, you're the first one up," Sever commented as he helped Houki to an upright position. Houki felt her heart tighten up as Sever had approached, as if withdrawing into a shell by the intimidation of his presence. What was this oppressive feeling she felt coming from this man? "You didn't hurt your head badly did you?"

Houki rubbed the back of head exploring for pain, and found none. She noticed Charlotte had also recovered and was checking herself as well.

"She didn't say what I thought she said, right?" Charlotte wondered, still a bit loopy from her own fainting spell.

With a grimace, Houki nodded an confirmation to Charlotte as Sever left to check her health. Immediately, her heart relaxed, and the constricting feeling simply ceased to be. There was something about him that instigated her fight-or-flight response, and it was so formidable that she naturally favored the flight response. And that something must have happened recently: it was a feeling she didn't have in his presence yesterday.

One by one, the others also awoke with Sever checking each one to make sure they weren't hurt. When he had verified everyone was OK, he asked, "What was that all about?"

"Ugh, you'll find out in a bit," Ichika muttered darkly. "She means well, but her sense of taste is...unique amongst us."

"I'll be damned if he does," Charlotte declared, her right hand clinched into a fervent fist. "As a member of the cooking club, I swear that whatever we have for lunch will at least be edible!" She immediately scurried off, desperately trying to make up the unknown minutes of a head start the fainting spell gave Cecilia.

"Then as for Ichika," Houki immediately latched onto the person-in-question's arm, "We'll get some sparring done."

"Wait, Houki," Ichika attempted to halt her attempts with a tinge of blush in his face, "I agree with Laura that we should strategize our movements as a unit. You know, the three of us."

"That's right!" Laura agreed. "And as my bride, he should be coming with me first, regardless. You can have him after we're done."

"Oh, no no no, this has to come first," Houki argued. "As you said before, he's got no practical experience with this specific weapon." Her eyes traveled to the metal bokken sheathed on Ichika's back.

"As a kendo practitioner, I'm best suited for helping him get used to the weapon and helping him understand what he can do with it. After that, then he'll know what role he can take in your unit. And he's not your bride!"

Laura hesitated for a second and then nodded her understanding. "I hate to admit it but your logic is sound. In that case, Panganiban, come with me and we'll discuss tactics in case we split off from Ichika."

"Sorry, but I'll have to pass as well," Sever declined. "I need to see Orimura-sensei to address my...battle competency."

"Ahh, the PTSD-like symptoms that cause you to be unable to attack," Laura pondered. "In that case, allow me to come along." She asked in a tone that wasn't really "may I come?" but more "I _am_ coming."

She grabbed Sever's arm, and with more strength Houki thought existed in that tiny body, dragged him unwillingly towards Orimura-sensei's office. "Between the Instructor and I, I'm sure we can beat that psychosomatic nonsense right out of you!"

"I knew I'd regret this!" Sever shouted back, as Ichika nodded his head in understanding.

"Ichika, you're hiding a smirk, aren't you?" Houki accused him.

"Damn, is it that apparent?"

"Not really, but you should make it more so!"

With a chuckle, Ichika glanced at Houki. "You don't really like him anymore, huh? Seriously, if that 'elephant' nonsense a couple of days ago was all it took to get on your bad side, I'm sure I would've crossed all the way to your dark side."

Houki flushed, again averting her eyes from Ichika's curious gaze, "It's not that I hate him, there's just something about him that I just don't like. It wasn't there a couple of days ago, but it's been getting stronger ever since Silvario Gospel. I just can't put my finger on why, however."

Houki clapped her hands loudly, dismissing her current train of thought and concentrating on the goal she told Laura. "We should get going, if lunch is at 10:45, we've got less than an hour to get you used to that metal bokken."

"Yukihira," Ichika recalled its name.

"You're kidding! That lump of steel is the hereditary weapon your family has been passing down as the ultimate iaido sword?" Houki laughed. "I agree, it should have been more extravagant, or at least shaped like a proper iaito!"

"Glad someone agrees with me," Ichika muttered.

"Well, let's get a move on!" Houki said impatiently. It just clicked in her head that she and Ichika just lucked out some time to themselves.

"Wait a bit," Ichika resisted her pull and put a hand on Rin's bare shoulder, exposed by how she had customized her uniform. Damn, Houki had forgotten she was there. After Cecilia had declared her culinary intent, Rin had been strangely silent. Houki looked closely at her face. It was as if she was lost in thought, her eyes focused on a seemingly empty spot in front of her. As Ichika placed his hand upon her, Rin suddenly jumped back and folded her arms about her chest, shivering all the while.

"Are you doing OK?" Ichika asked, full of the same concern he had shown to Houki. A flame ignited in Houki's heart, one she recognized as an ember of jealousy. She stomached the feeling as Ichika's consideration for others was one of his most attractive features.

"Yeah, yeah." Rin did not look at all OK. It was if her body temperature had suddenly dropped. Even her face had blanched to a pale white, and it blued rapidly.

Ichika noticed it himself, and put a warm comforting arm around her. "Let's get you into a nice warm bath, or something. You feel so cold!"

"Whoa, whoa, you pervert!" Houki shouted, her ember growing into a wildfire of jealousy. But that wasn't exactly the impression she wanted to give him, so after a second to recollect herself, she continued, "I can do that, you go to the practice room and warm up. I'll be by shortly."

"Yeah, yeah," Ichika droned and left for where they usually practiced together. Houki felt Rin's forehead and skin and noticed that it was just as Ichika had said: cold and clammy. Half carrying, half dragging Rin back to the dormitory, Houki wondered just what could have caused this sudden loss of body heat when Rin whispered a phrase Houki didn't understand, but yet still sound familiar to her for some strange reason.

"Kazıklı Be"

"HAAAH!" Ichika had found that swinging this sword felt almost exactly like practicing with subarito. The extra weight had made his swings a bit harder to control, but the strange metal resisted any damage or denting due to his inexperience. However, swinging at empty air was completely different from hitting another sword or aiming at a body part, so instead he sat down, closed his eyes, and meditated in seiza.

All he had been doing were simple swings, concentrating on the overhead smash as it was the way for him to get most of his power out. But the one thing he hadn't tried was any iaido, the true fruit of his training. Ever since he started IS, he had been focusing on simple kendo basics, and so had never held real steel since then. His hands shook as contemplated iaido without a real blade and sheathe. Without a proper sheathe, he had no idea how to draw the weapon. The thing on his back was a makeshift holder that left his hands free, quickly made by Kail's. By wrapping strips of his blazer around the Yukihira, Kail used Alteration to transplant the seams onto the free ends, leaving a very tiny bit of slack. The extra material was discarded into the nearest trash can, but Ichika had to put in a requisition for a new blazer.

He thought about placing the sword in the cloth sheath and drawing it like that, but he judged that the friction induced by the techniques would probably fray it quickly, making it useless for the next draw. Which means that at least, he needed to find a suitable replacement for a saya, the throat of the sheath of a normal iaito. However, since it was the shape of a bokken, it would have to be wider than normal saya, and he was sure they didn't make them for bokken. He made a circle with his right thumb and index finger, and wrapped that circle around the the base of the bokken's blade. He removed the blade from the sheath, keeping his hand in place to check how the draw might feel like. The friction on his fingers caused them to rapidly heat up, but at the speed he drew it it was just bearable. After fully drawing the weapon, he set it by his right side and brought the hand circle to his closed eyes. Opening one, he examined the new redness on his fingers. "I guess she'd need to be a bit larger than this," he muttered.

"I'm afraid to ask, but who exactly are you referring to?"

Ichika focused through the circle in front of his eye and saw Houki in full kendo gear and sitting in the same seiza position Ichika was in.

"Well, I guess I'm talking about myself, Houki," Ichika explained, returning his attention to the circle his fingers inscribed. "You see, when I was rubbing my sword, I was trying to get a feel for how thick it actually was."

"W-well, aren't most b-boys' swords the same size generally?" Houki stammered.

"Well, I guess it would depends on one's chosen technique, but I inherited quite a thick sword, myself," Ichika said dryly, getting up to wander the room room for something he could at least use.

HUAA! Ichika was dimly aware of Houki gasping for breath, and wanted to find out what happened, but he was concentrating on not losing the shape he had made with his fingers. So he called out, "You okay, Houki? Swallow a fly or something?""

"S-S-S-swallow? Never! I hear it's really bitter!" Came her answer.

"Well I guess, I've never taken one myself, but I'm glad you're OK," he replied.

"Well I hope you never do. That's just plain wrong!"

"Well it's nothing to get that agitated about. Those little buggers somehow find their way into everybody's mouth."

"I think not! You'd have to want it to get into your mouth before you even think about swallowing!"

"Yeah, yeah," Ichika droned, tired of the inane conversation. "Hey, if you're not busy. Can you help me look for one?"

"Huh?" Houki replied.

"A Saya, you know, something I can put my sword into. She'll have an opening about 'yay big'." He raised his right hand up and pointed to the circle he made with it.

"Who's this Saya character?" Houki shouted, jumping to her feet. Ichika slowly turned around as Houki covered the distance between them in increasingly heavier and foreboding steps. "I'll have you know that even though I'm a bit smaller I can totally take your sword easily!"

_Kail was right, _Ichika agreed in his head, _it was quite fun to see his friends with an agitated expression. _In Houki's case, Ichika found her current state incredibly to his liking. Her cheeks were flushed, and instead of her usual taciturn and slightly prudish personality, she seemed a great deal more vulnerable. Within her eyes, he could see a yearning, like a desire that she could barely keep within herself. This was the Houki he remembered saving back in primary school before she moved out of his life.

As Ichika enjoyed the sight of his first childhood friend displaying an unnatural tender side, Houki moved to embrace him. Still in full kendo regalia.

"Oof!" Ichika felt the wind get squeezed out of him as Houki continued her constraining embrace.

"Breathe! Can't...breathe!" he tapped Houki's chest plate, trying to get her attention. After an agonizing five seconds, she finally realized what she was doing and abruptly let go. Ichika fell to the ground, panting heavily to catch his breath.

"S-sorry," Houki turned her gaze and apologize to him. "I got caught up in the moment. We should get to practicing, we lost a lot of time with that nonsense."

"Heh...Heh... Agreed." Ichika gasped out. "But I'd like to continue just a bit longer."

"No!" Houki rejected the notion strongly. "No, but if you work hard and we finish early, we can continue without the gear," she added shyly, the last part barely above a whisper.

"What? No, it's because we need to practice that I need the saya," Ichika explained patiently.

"What does a girl have to do with practicing? Why can't I do it?" Houki whined, a tone Ichika wasn't used to hearing from her.

"Uhhh, what are you talking about?" Ichika inquired nervously. "You're the only person I could ever practice my techniques on seriously."

"Huh?"

"You know, my iaido. My inherited swordstyle? The style I used as a kid until I got my IS? Hello, are you listening?"

Houki made no reaction, so Ichika continued his explanation.

"You see, Chifuyu-nee didn't give me a sheathe of any kind, or even just a saya, so I needed to find a suitable replacement. I didn't practice it here at the Academy because Byakushiki's one-off doesn't require me to put power into my attacks, but I decided to do a bit of practice with it. After all, it's supposedly the ultimate iaito, even without its edge. So I've been looking around trying to find a suitable replacement in order to practice with it. To be honest, I'm not having much luck with finding one myself, so you think you can spend some time and...help...me...look?"

Ufufufuu! Ufufufuu!

Ichika's words caught in his throat after Houki started her quiet, but eery laugh.

"'Saya', he says, 'Saya'. He's not even talking about a girl. A saya, a saya?" she mumbled as she dug into a nearby drawer.

"Houki? Houki-chan? Shinonono-san?" Ichika tried multiple variations of her name, but she responded to none of them.

Finally, she found what she was looking for and spun around quickly to face him.

"Shinonono-sama?" Ichika's last ditch effort was sternly rebuffed by Houki and her fierce glare.

In Houki's tightly clenched hand was a Japanese katana, and not one he recognized. It might have been even been a mass-produced one, but as Houki drew the blade and pointed it at Ichika's nose, he could see that it's quality was irrelevant compared to the visible sharpness in front of him.

In her other hand, Houki allowed gravity to slowly pull the sheath down her grip until she clasped around the tip's end, holding it like another sword, the throat of the sheathe away from her hand. This was placed in front of Ichika's face as well, although Ichika's attention remained on the actual sword itself.

"This is the saya, right?" she whispered quietly.

_Really?_ Thought Ichika. She really didn't need the theatrics if she was simply going to verify what he had meant by a saya.

"No, no, I need one about...oh man, I lost the shape," he realized. "But I do need a saya a bit wider than that."

"This is the saya...this is the saya...this is the saya..."

"Uh...Shinonono-sama?" Houki lowered her swords, allowing them to touch the ground. Ichika wanted to relax, but something in his gut resisted the order. Instead, it coiled his legs, ready to jump at any instant of danger.

"This is the saya...that I got hot and bothered COMPETING WITH!" With that yell, Houki jumped in the air, raising the sword and sheathe like twin swords, and smashing them down in front of her. If Ichika hadn't dove out of the way, the two weapons would have found purchase on Ichika's unguarded, unprotected body.

Ichika dove towards his metal bokken, grabbing it mid-dive and rolling into a kneeling position. From that position, he blocked Houki's next attack with the blade, but the force of Houki's blow knocked him off of his knee. As Ichika went flying, Houki's swept upwards with the sheath, catching Ichika hard on the side, sending him flying further.

Ichika rolled with the attack, allowing Houki's energy to send him further away so he would have more time to recover. Somewhere mid roll, he realized that he didn't feel at all damaged. Sure, he felt the pain, but the bone-breaking blow didn't actually break anything. Something in his gut told him he had used Reinforcement to strengthen his body, limiting any real damage done to him. With this knowledge, he quickly righted himself and decided to trust himself to his instincts.

The two fought all across the room, Houki in full combat mode offensively chasing the defensive Ichika all across the room. Time was forgotten as the two danced together in a waltz of violence. Finally, Houki overextended her attack, leaving her precariously off-balanced. She righted herself quickly, but Ichika had been waiting for her fatigue to catch up with her. He had backed off with a long jump backwards, nearly hitting the wall behind him.

Houki rushed him, needing less than 2 giant steps to reach the best position for another double sword overhand strike, but this time Ichika was armed and ready, even sidestepping a bit to the right to make it easier for his next attack. He had placed the sword near his left hip, reaching over his waist with his right. Very similar to the classic iaido stance, but instead of a sheath, he held the sword in his left hand. He had faith in his technique, one that had been tempered by generations of his family and grown proficient with in the 10 years he had spent learning it. He had faith in his instinct, that it would be sufficient control for his new found power of Reinforcement and apply it to the area he felt needed it. And he had faith in his intent, that he would not kill or harm Houki with this attack.

"Majinken!" he roared out the name of the first technique strong enough to even be named in his sword style. In the space of an instant, his weapon became a glitter of light between he and Houki. His left hand and makeshift sheathe rapidly heated up to the point of being a first-degree burn, but Ichika had faith there was no actual damage to his hand. In fact, he favored the burn, as the pain told him he had performed the draw/sheath movement perfectly. He kept the grip ready, his body reacting before he even thought of getting ready for another attack. But as he saw the effect his attack had wrought, Ichika relaxed, knowing full well he had succeeded in his his technique, his instinct, and his intent.

His Majinken was a simple yet complicated attack. It could be described to the casual observer as an incredibly quick vertical slash and return, but one with a bit of fighting experience could gather a bit more from the movement. Ichika himself thought of it fairly simply: it was the technique of a boxer's uppercut, combined with the speed of iaido, and the strength of the blade. Ichika twisted his body, coiling all of his strength of his muscles. Like a boxer going for a devastating uppercut, he added the strength of his legs, hips, torso, and arms into his draw, twisting his body into a shape only achievable by his slight frame. It was a move Ichika found was both impossible and unnecessary in a bulky IS, and so was neglected for the better part of a year. With the speed of his draw, the power of his entire body, and the strength of his blade combined into a single blow, he had met and completely overpowered Houki's own overhead strike.

The slight sidestep he had took earlier had positioned Houki's blades so that they were skewed to Ichika's, making them a perfect target for Ichika's vertical strike. He made contact with the sheath first, easily shattering it into a cavalcade of splinters that floated in the air like sawdust. It was an outcome Ichika was prepared for, what he worried about was the other sword. He had never used this sword on anything, much less another sword. But, he had faith, and that included faith in the sword his sister passed to him. That's why even with his precautions, he had committed to the strike and accepted all outcomes from that strike.

Like a pane of glass shattering, so did Houki's sword, becoming fragments of steel so small one could almost mistake it for diamond dust. With the sun streaming brightly through the window, the sword dust scattered the light like miniature prisms. Both Houki and Ichika paused to watch the spectacle, their fight forgotten. Houki dropped her weapons: the rest of Houki's sword making a metallic clang, and Houki's sheathe disintegrating into tiny fragments upon impact. Ichika returned the bokken to the sheathe on his back. Although both extremely tired with their muscles yearning for oxygen, neither Houki nor Ichika dared to breath; partly in fear of breathing in the sword and sheath dust, but mostly in fear of disturbing the amazing sight in front of them. For a full minute they held their breath watching as the dust finally settle, before finally allowing their bodies the chance to respire normally. Like the trained warriors they were, they controlled their breathing to be as unobtrusive as possible, to give their bodies the best chance of recovering quickly.

After a few more seconds, Ichika called out to Houki. "Are you OK?"

"Yes, just, yes, I'm fine," Houki responded still shocked by awe for his technique. But Ichika could tell that she was lying. In fact, he bounded forward awkwardly to catch the suddenly slumping Houki. Using his toes to propel himself forward, he jumped like a grappler, awkwardly embracing Houki and keeping her from falling onto the damaged floorboards she had been straddling. He ignored the sharp ends of the kendo gear his attack had sheared, desperately trying to keep Houki's ungeared legs from cutting themselves on the aftermath of his attack. Once again, he trusted his instinct to Reinforce the body parts necessary to keep himself from being injured.

The reason why his attack had a name was because the attack itself was an expression of the maximum potential of Ichika's fighting spirit. By putting all his power, speed, and strength into one attack, not just his opponent but the very air and earth would be rent by his one attack. Just like how a perfect iaido technique creates a wave of air, so did Ichika's Majinken. But the gust was so strong it tore up the floorboards as if a Majin's fang itself had crawled up from the underworld itself simply to extend the range of Ichika's attack. In fact, almost two meters from where Ichika stood, the wave of devastation finally ended, leaving a line of destruction as wide as Ichika's bokken itself.

"Ichika...that was amazing," Houki gaped, her face aflush with exhaustion. "By the way how long are you going to hold me?"

"Until you can stand under your own power," Ichika replied, still surveying the damage created by his technique. Compared to his sister's, his Majinken was inherently more crude and destructive. He remembered his sister performing the very same technique with a classic iaito, creating a wind that drew the dust into it, making it visible. He remembered watching it cross the dojo, a full 5 meters across with all the speed of Chifuyu-nee's attack, and bisecting a scarecrow target cleanly in half. Her attack hadn't even scratched the floor, much less decimated it like his. He wondered if it was simply the sword that created the different outcome, and if it was why she mentioned that Yukihira's focus was "Impact".

"Then, then just a little while longer," Houki requested, lightly wrapping her arms around Ichika's neck. Ichika noticed a lack of strength in her arms. In fact they trembled, most likely from the blow Ichika gave her that shattered her weapons to dust. With that revelation, Ichika realized that Houki had taken the full brunt of the gust his attack had made, even though he had aimed for the swords. He turned his attention back to Houki and her gear. Her do, her chest piece made out of bamboo had cracked like an egg, exposing the Hakama Houki wore under it. The Hakama itself had also been torn, exposing the sarashi underneath that.

Ichika quickly looked up, since his current position prevented him from seeing her tare, the skirt-like gear worn on her waist. And he did not see the piece of bamboo that had gotten squeezed in her cleavage. Her men, her head guard was objectively the most damaged of all her gear. The face guard, the crisscrossing bars of metal, had been crushed inwards and broken. Ichika could see pointy end getting dangerously close to Houki's face.

"Houki, let me take off your men," Ichika ordered, worried that Houki wouldn't be able to get it off herself with injury.

"No, not yet," Houki flushed even deeper. "I don't want you to let go just yet. I haven't had enough of -"

"Look," Ichika interrupted, a bit agitated, "I still have the mission to do and all sorts of preparation to do. And I'd at least like a bath before I meet with everyone for lunch. But I can't just leave you alone knowing you might have trouble taking off your gear. So please, stop being stubborn and let me help you."

"Fine," Houki pouted, and with Ichika's help made her way to the undamaged doorway of the practice room.

"You did this?" Her voice shook with awe once again.

"Yes, but it's not something I could recreate with an IS. This is my best technique, but I'll be honest, I didn't think it would be so...effective."

"I think you'll be the muscle in this operation, Ichika."

"I agree, unless Sever gets over his dislike of attacking. I think he's physically stronger than me."

"No, it's not your strength," Houki shook her head, "it's the control you have over it. I admire how, no matter how much strength you obtain, you seem to always be in control and never let it her anyone."

That statement made her realize the condition of her men. Like a child, she bowed her head, waiting for Ichika to help remove it.

"Ah, actually look me in the eyes. I want to make sure I don't scratch you.

"That's probably the hardest thing I've had to do today," Houki whispered.

Ichika chuckled. "Yeah, but don't worry, if I keep pressure on the back of your head I should be able to remove it without damaging that face of yours."

Houki trembled in Ichika's arms as he slowly removed her men. He stared intently into the face guard, trying to see clearly how much progress he had made. Houki closed her eyes, probably in fear of being scratched, and her face became so red Ichika worried for her blood pressure. Eventually, he got the head guard off, and then bolted out the door.

"Hey! Aren't you going to help me get off the rest of my gear?" Houki's echo called out after him.

"It didn't look that bad to me, you should be able to take the rest of it off yourself," Ichika replied, hoping his was understandable as well. "In fact, you may want to after seeing the thing I absolutely positively did not see or focus on."

"Kyaaa!"

That embarrassed squeal told him that not only was his echo audible, but his assumption was correct. He checked the cell in his pocket, realizing he had about 15 minutes to bathe before he was expected for lunch.

Rin awoke from her nap, groggy and weak. She didn't have the condition, but she wondered if this was what people with low blood pressure in the morning felt like. She couldn't remember when she started feeling like this: Yamada-sensei had dismissed them and left, and then all of a sudden her neck hurt and she got all cold and weird. She raised a hand to her neck, feeling all around for a bug bite or something along those lines and found nothing.

After lazing in bed for a minute, she sat up and pulled out her cell. She had about 15 minutes until lunchtime, a thought that instantly turned her stomach over. But Charlotte was there, she'd probably be able to make it at least somewhat edible. After all, she did join the cooking club with Sever a while ago. There was hope for lunch, maybe.

But first, she needed to take a bath. For some odd reason, she reeked of sweat. It wouldn't do to go to lunch smelling like that, especially with Ichika there. Crawling out of bed she made her way to the bath, figuring she'll grab her clothes after. Since her roommate Cecilia was busy cooking, she'd have the room to herself and be able to grab her clothes in relative privacy.

She didn't even bother to lock the bathroom door as she stripped naked and drew a bath, placing her used clothes in a basket near the door. She didn't turn on the fan, allowing the steam to fill the room. She was just about to jump in when she heard her dormitory door open and a deep voice that wasn't Ichika's groan, "Owwwww."

"I'd say we've had a breakthrough, Instructor," Laura's voice traveled through the wall.

"You broke something, and it wasn't a 'through'," complained Sever. Rin heard the springs of the bed compress as someone laid down in it.

"At the very least, we've upped your combat proficiency," Chifuyu-nee declared.

"But not the way I expected," Laura admitted. "I had no idea that a PTSD victim could lose an entire skill-set like that, and become better at a different one."

"Well, it's not actually PTSD itself, but heavy trauma in general," Chifuyu-nee explained, going into teacher mode. "It's not common, but there have been reports of lightning strike victims suddenly learning to reproduce their memories as paintings, or a torture victim suddenly able to play the piano by ear after therapy. It could be a dormant natural ability suddenly activated or something, but I'd say we just witnessed that very phenomena."

"Yes, and it only took a combination of mental and physical trauma to manufacture that effect," Sever concluded dryly. "If you don't mind, Orimura-sensei, I'm going to rest before lunch."

"Of course, that's why we brought you back to your room," explained Chifuyu-nee.

"In that case, I'll wait for Ichika here," Laura said.

"Didn't you say you were going to take a bath yourself?" Sever asked.

"Yes, I figured that Ichika would think along the same lines and take one himself. If he does, we can take one together and not have to waste the water," Laura answered.

Rin barely saved herself from a face-fault by catching the side of the bath. Outside, she could hear Chifuyu-nee dragging Laura off, Laura complaining, "What's wrong with taking a bath together? It serves the purpose of efficiently using the water to clean ourselves and getting some skin-ship with my bride!"

Rin could almost picture Sever's head shaking in his bed as he wondered aloud, "Sometimes I wonder if what that girl says is simply a naïve but practical way of spending time with him, or confidence in her sexuality? Reminds me of Madoka, but she knew that her sexiness wouldn't have any effect on me."

_Who was Madoka?_ Rin wondered. She didn't know any girls in the Academy with that name, but once she got out of the bath she could do a simple directory search for her and maybe dig a bit deeper into Sever's secrets. If she could dig enough, maybe she could help Natalia and Sever reconnect as siblings. It was incredibly obvious that Sever was uncomfortable around Natalia, and even though Natalia said she would try, Rin could feel the broken trust she had for him.

But Rin felt there was something missing, something she had overlooked since Sever entered her room. Wait, that was it! It wasn't her room! Chifuyu-nee said she and Laura brought him to his room to rest. Which means somehow she had entered his room by mistake, probably since his door was still broken. But wait, if she was actually in Sever's room, then that means the room also belongs to...

"Sever, that you?" Ichika called out.

Rin gasped lightly, how did she wander in here of all places? Wait, she remembered Houki assisting her into bed, and then leaving in a hurry. Wait, she used to be Ichika's roommate too, which means she probably forgot she moved out and placed Rin in her own bed. Rin's head reeled from the revelation as the conversation between the two boys continued.

"Yo," Sever called back in response to Ichika's query.

"Phew, you're a mess."

"Thank Laura and your sister. They tried to beat my inability to attack out of me."

"Did it work?"

"Not at all."

Ichika laughed at Sever's casual admission of failure. Rin felt that these two acted more like brothers than friends. While Sever forced himself to even touch Natalia's hand, his camaraderie with Ichika felt completely natural. It actually felt a bit like the relationship she had herself with Ichika, the ability to be both close friends and rivals.

"So what did you come here for, anyways?" Sever asked.

"Ah, came to take a bath," Ichika answered.

Wait, what?

"Ah then you're too late, you know."

"What, someone besides you and me is using our bath?" Ichika suggested sarcastically.

"Laura was just here and told me she wanted to bathe with you before lunch."

"Whoa, whoa, she's using our bathroom?"

"Your nose is bleeding."

"T-that's from training," Ichika stammered.

"Right..." Sever droned, not even trying to hide his disbelief. "Anyways, Orimura-sensei dragged her out, probably back to her own room."

"So the bathroom is free then."

"Yeah."

"Alright, I'll grab a change of clothes and take one myself then. You coming in after?"

"I probably should, but I'm having trouble resisting the lull of this bed. Tell you what, you go bathe while I nap, have some lunch with the girls at the appointed time, and I'll come late after my own bath, Sever suggested.

"But it would be better for all of us to eat together," Ichika pointed out. Rin heard drawers open as Ichika searched fro a clean uniform. "Company makes food better, remember? On the rooftop with your sister and everyone?"

"'I' wasn't even at that picnic, but I know what you mean. Eat slowly then, I'll make sure to take a short bath. Just leave the water when you're finished, ok?"

Rin's ears perked up at the emphasis Sever put on the word "I". She remembered that picnic as well, when she first met (outside class) Sever's sister Natalia, nicknamed Nefer. That Nefer had stubbornly clung to her sister's (brother's?) side the entire time and was not happy that she (he) had shared his cuisine with her, Ichika, and the other girls. It was a different side of Natalia that she had never relapsed to since the Silvario Gospel incident. In fact, she seemed more mature and serious. Rin wondered if her transformation was a result of her own trauma like what Chifuyu-nee mentioned.

"That's doable. You empty your hamper?" Ichika accepted Sever's terms and made his own request.

"Uhh, probably not. Sorry."

"That's fine, I'll just toss my clothes with yours. Dump them into the laundry basket after your bath, ok?"

"Will do."

"Alright then, I'm going in." Ichika opened the door. Through the steam, Rin could see Ichika shield his eyes from the burst of steam that escaped. She also noticed that the visibility through the steam had increased dramatically, and she was still naked. Ichika slammed the door in surprise, so Rin took the opportunity to hide in the bathtub.

"Dude, the steam. Why didn't you tell me a bath was already drawn?" Ichika complained.

An exaggerated loud snore answered Ichika's query. "You're not fooling me!" he called back. Somehow, Sever made the snore even louder, causing Ichika to reply, "Fine, don't answer me. Whatever, least I don't have to draw it myself."

Once again he opened the door, but this time ready for the escaping steam. Rin peeked out over the walls of the tub as Ichika pulled out a basket, muttering, "Dammit, he didn't empty after all. Well, I'll make sure to remind him before I leave, even if I gotta wake him up."

Ichika placed his clean clothes into a different, empty basket, then stripped quickly, placing his clothes into the half-filled one. Rin caught herself staring at Ichika's toned backside, quietly congratulating herself for having the incredible idea of hiding in the bathtub. Then as Ichika turned to wash himself before getting into the bath, Rin retreated below the tub's walls. The reason was twofold: to hide from Ichika's view and to protect his modesty. But to be honest with herself, it was mostly due to reason number one.

She heard a pail of water splash over Ichika's body, then a second time. A third time. A fourth time. A fifth time. With each time, Rin's heartbeat grew faster and louder. She could feel her face flush with heat, and her body become more and more sensitive to the ripples in the water. She dove under the water completely, hoping the water would muffle the sound of her heartbeat and cool her rapidly overheating body. Rin lost count of the many times Ichika rinsed himself to make himself ready for the bath, until finally at the limit of her breath control, he stepped into the bath. Specifically, in the area between her legs, dangerously close to one of her most sensitive body parts.

That was it, Rin couldn't take anymore! She jumped out of the water, dragging Ichika into the bath like a water oni. With one arm around his chest, another around his mouth, and her legs wrapped around his waist, they splashed back into the tub awkwardly, displacing so much water that it only reached about shoulder high with the both of them in it. On any other day, Rin would estimate the actual volume to be about 20 or so liters, but right now the amount of water wasn't the first thing on her mind.

"Shhh! Don't talk, don't even make a noise," she whispered in Ichika's ear. Freaked out of his wits, Ichika complied, nodding furiously against the cleavage of her petite bosoms. Rin couldn't help it, she let out a slight moan from the sensation. That split-second of inattentiveness was all the opening Ichika needed to force himself out of Rin's grip and to the opposite end of the tub. He turned to face Rin, who hissed "Don't turn around you perv!"

Ichika arrested his movement and concentrated on the spigot in front of him while Rin fought for control of her body and emotions. "At least refill the tub," she whispered, turning around to face the other wall.

Rin heard the sound of running water as Ichika ran the tap, yelping slightly as the hot water deposited itself right into his lap. He backed off instinctively, crashing into Rin's back. With nowhere to go, Ichika stood up, intending to leave the bath. Rin reached up, grabbing Ichika's wrist who stopped at the soft touch of her hand.

"Can we talk? Just the two of us. We can...bathe together."

Rin dared not look into Ichika's face, it took everything in her to simply not claim him here and now. In fact, the only thing stopping her from doing just that was the knowledge that the Ichika she knew would hate her for it. After an intense minute of deliberation on Ichika's part, he finally sat down back in the tub, pressing his back against Rin's. Rin's hand wandered down to grab Ichika's, who made no effort to avoid it.

For another intense minute, the two sat in total silence, neither relaxing nor bathing, simply Rin squeezing Ichika's hand. Finally, Ichika decided to break the silence. "Last time we did this, we were in grade school, huh?" he said.

"Shh! Not so loud, the walls are thin!" she whispered back.

"Sorry," he replied, dropping his volume to equal Rin's.

"But, yes, grade school," Rin agreed.

"We're a bit too old to be doing this, wouldn't you agree?"

"Yes."

"And I don't think I could relax like this, you know?"

"Yes." Rin lowered her face into the water, thinking even this warm water is cooler than the wildfire taking place in her face. It was only this morning that she almost shivered to death, and no she was so hot she felt like exploding.

"So, I'm going to step out now?"

"No!" Rin grabbed his hand once again.

Just then, Ichika's stomach rumbled. With a sigh, he squeezed Rin's hand and explained, "Look Rin, we have lunch in a few minutes. I don't really want to be late, especially after Cecilia and Charlotte put their time into making it. I have faith at least one of them will make something edible."

Rin smirked, "And I'll bet you a night on the town that it's Charlotte's."

Ichika used his free hand to rub Rin's head behind him. "Hey, you can say things other than 'Yes'. Congratulations."

Rin allowed herself to be petted like that. Normally, she would never let Ichika treat her like a child, but this was special. But she still had to maintain her confidence. "We still have that bet, you know."

"I didn't agree to it," Ichika protested, "You can't hold me accountable for something I didn't agree to."

"And you shouldn't have walked into a lady's bath." It was a line that felt like classic Rin. Rin felt like she was back in control and back to her usual self.

"It's _my_ bath," Ichika pointed out.

"Until I got in it," Rin retorted. "Take responsibility for your mistake!"

"Ugh, why doesn't logic ever work on you?" Ichika complained. "Fine, I bet I'll be able to eat Cecilia's food without coughing, choking, vomiting, fainting, or outright refusing to eat it. May I please get changed?"

"Wait, wait, what about me?" Rin climbed halfway out of the bath, making sure to cover her top. Ichika's face went red and he hurriedly turned around.

"Sever, oh Sever!" he called out loudly. "I know you're awake."

No response.

"Sever!" Ichika's voice cracked with panic as he heard Rin remove herself from his bath even more.

"Yeah, yeah, I figured someone else was in there as soon as you asked me if I drew a bath," Sever confessed, this time his voice coming from right outside the door. "Who exactly is it? Did Laura escape and sneak back in here or something?"

"No, no, it's Rin. Ughaaa!" Ichika gasped as Rin slapped his back in embarrassment.

"I can't believe you told him I was here!" She hissed.

"Sorry," he whispered back. Calling back to Sever, he asked, "Anyways, can you head to Rin's room and grab a spare uniform for her?"

"Yeah, sure," he cordially replied. "Can I come in there and grab her key?"

"Su-" "NO!" Rin interrupted Ichika's approval with a high pitched rejection.

"Alight, I'll break in then. See you in a minute."

"Wait!" Rin called out, but no acknowledgment followed.

"Well, it's a good thing he went to get clothes. It would be embarrassing to go through the hallways naked, right?" Ichika attempted to justify his decision.

"I could have simply worn my dirty clothes," Rin ground out.

"Oh...but then you'd have to take a bath again," Ichika not willing to admit defeat so easily. "And anyways, I should be changing by now..."

"Oh no," Rin growled, full of embarrassment-fueled anger. "No, you're going to make this up to me, even if you have to endure every blow of my anger!" She took a heavy step forward out of the bath.

"Oh no, not this time," Ichika warned. "I just did that for Houki and it almost made me late for lunch. My stomach couldn't stand another interruption." His stomach rumbled again, louder than before.

"I'll just have to use the last weapon in my arsenal," he said dramatically. He took a deep breath, and in the deepest voice he could muster, he called out "PERVERTTTTTT-"

At this, Rin's anger gave way to self-consciousness and she dove back into the tub with a splash. She peeked out over the wall to witness a toweled Ichika finish dramatically turning around.

"-STAREEEEEE" It was the worst kind of attack, one that targeted a girl's self-doubt. It was a dirty, sneaky, cowardly attack that was surprisingly effective against Rin. She sank into the tub, cursing the self-consciousness she felt due to her small breasts. By the time she had recovered, she had lost her own opportunity for a Pervert Stare as Ichika had quickly put on his undergarments and pants.

Ichika smirked with victory and then continued the assault, "STAREEEEEE!"

Again, Rin sunk below the walls of the tub, completely overwhelmed by Ichika's "attack".

The next time she peeked out, Ichika had full dressed and had just opened the door. With a last smirk back, he closed it securely behind him. Even for all his trickery, he was still a decent guy who had considered the feelings of the people around him. Rin felt like she had fallen even more in love with the man.

"Hey, you finished, Ichika?" Sever's voice brought her out of her romantic lull.

"Yeah, at least I don't smell like blood and sweat anymore."

"Awesome. By the way, here's Rin's uniform."

"Thanks."

Knock, knock. "Hey Rin!" Ichika called through the door. "Sever brought your clothes for you. I'll hang them on the coat hook on our door and step out for a bit. When you come out, don't drain the water. Sever still needs to take one himself. Also, don't worry about your dirty clothes; Sever volunteered to take them out."

Rin waited to hear the two boys hang the uniform and then step out the door, closing it with a loud thud and a secure click to let her know she was alone. The thought did cross her mind that they had simply closed the door to make her think they had left, and instead wait to peep on her from inside the room; but Rin had faith in Ichika that he would be honorable. Sever she wasn't quite to sure about.

After she dried off, she drained the water in the tub. That water was the sacred water she has shared with Ichika, no other man would get to experience her indirectly except him. Secondly, she gathered her clothes, especially her undergarments. Just in case Sever was a perv.

After completing the two tasks, she cautiously left the bathroom, wrapped in a towel in case her doubts came true. Alas, a careful inspection of the room uncovered no perverted teenager hiding within. Instead, Rin could hear both the boys' voices from outside the heavy door. It was impossible to understand what they said exactly due to the soundproofing between rooms, but the door had always the weakest point of soundproofing.

With her fears allayed, Rin set about changing into the new uniform Sever had kindly broken into her room to retrieve. She shuddered at the thought of the damage a guy like him made in order to get into her room, but that was something she could get him to fix later. Just then, she noticed a lump in her blazer pocket, with a similar lump on the other side. Reaching into both pockets at the same time, she looked at what was clenched in her hand, then fell to the ground on all fours in a sign of epic depression.

"Rin! Rin! Are you OK?" Ichika pounded on the door in concern.

"Dude, she probably tripped. She's fine," Sever tried to calm him down. "Anyways, she's changing, so we should give her a chance to answer before we barge right in."

Now that they were closer, Rin realized that they must be right at the door in order for her to hear them clearly enough to be understood. She felt happy that Ichika cared enough about her to check on her, and that Sever was apparently sensible enough to remind Ichika that she was indecent. But it still didn't change the Rin's opinion that Sever was a pervert. In fact, looking at the evidence in her hand had only cemented Rin's assumptions of Sever's perverseness.

Somehow, someway, Sever had found her undergarments. And not just any undergarments, but her special battle panties. The battle panties made of soft lace, an elegant design, and a sultry red color. The battle panties customized for her hips not one week ago and had been teased constantly by Cecilia about. The same battle panties she had hidden in the depths of her underwear drawer as a result of said teasing. Which meant Sever had dug through her undergarment drawer, and for some reason chose these to have her wear.

With a sullen gaze she glanced over to her other hand. Within it was a bra, made of the same soft lace, a similar-looking design, and the same sultry red. With evermore dread, Rin realized that after raiding her panties, he had looked through her brassieres looking for something to match her panties. With another wave of depression she banged her head against the door.

Pound! Pound! "Rin!" Ichika's shouts pierced through the sad haze in her head and she managed to reply, "I tripped. I'm OK." Ichika's pounding stopped and Rin looked back to her second undergarment.

But wait. Rin realized something was odd with the brassiere in her hand. She remembered searching for the matching pair to her panties that very same week, but found that it had only been sold in sizes upwards of C. But since she had already had her panties tailored to her hips, she decided to get the bra anyways, and wear cups to increase her Bs to Cs. But this brassiere felt smaller than a C. Out of morbid curiosity, she hesitantly equipped her bra. To her surprise, it was just the right size. In fact, it hugged her rightly just like most of her other correctly sized bras. She removed the bra to check its tag. Sure enough, it read Size C, but it was apparent someone had altered it to be a size smaller. How the hell did...

"Hey, you gonna take all day?" Sever called into the room irritatedly.

"We're going to be late for lunch," Ichika reminded her.

Ichika did mention Sever needed his own bath, so Rin acknowledged her defeat and wore the panties anyways. She found it ironic that the panties she wore now were purchased for use before an intimate event, not after. With that bitter thought in her head, she quickly dressed up in her customized uniform, appearing before the boys with her hair tied in an unkempt ponytail.

"Sorry Ichika, I'm going to need to head back to my room and brush my hair properly before I meet up with you guys," she apologized, not letting Ichika see the defeat in her face. _And change into more decent undergarments,_ she confessed to herself.

"I'll come with and wait for you," Ichika responded. "Oh wait, let me grab my cell. I left it in my room."

Rin wanted to reject his offer, but found that she really wanted his company right now. Although, she felt guilty about planning to shut him out as she changed. Still, she peeked into Ichika's room to see him grab it from its charging dock on his desk. But there was something weird about the placement.

"Ichika, that's an odd dock, isn't it?" Rin wondered. Ichika stopped

"Hmm? It's the one that came with the phone," Ichika answered. The dock was made in a way to save space. One had to simply insert the phone into the pins on the bottom and a clamp would hold it in place as it charged. It was held upright as to be as unobtrusive as possible.

"And the camera on it, it works?" Rin continued.

"Yes," Ichika confirmed. Like most cell phones, Ichika's had two cameras: one on the front so that one could use video chat, and one on the back to take high resolution pictures. Of course, one could take high-res video as well, and quite a bit with the advances in memory technology made in recent years.

"You know, I was testing it a bit ago, so I know it works," Ichika added unnecessarily. "I had to make sure it worked for the mission, you see."

"About how long ago?" Rin's question came through gritted teeth.

All of a sudden, Sever broke out into a loud, uncontrollable fit of guffaws, grasping the door frame for support.

Ichika turned around in surprise at Sever's reaction, only to be forcibly turned away be the partially summoned arm of Rin's IS.

"How...long...ago..." Rin repeated.

"On the way here," Ichika answered.

"And you stopped testing it?"

It was at this moment Rin finally learned what Ichika's "Oh, Crap!" face looked like. It was a face that said "I didn't say that", "Please don't hear what I said", "I'm sorry", and "I'm resigned to any punishment you see fit, but please, not in the nuts" all at the same time.

It was after Rin had walked away in a huff that Kail finally quit laughing and helped the mess known as Ichika off the floor.

"You know, I'm amazed how well you took that beating. You don't look at all like someone who got mauled by a giant bio-mechanical arm?" Kail observed. Indeed, not only did Ichika not show any form of visible damage, but his clothes didn't have one tear or blemish.

"It's weird, Reinforcement just comes naturally to me. Sometimes I feel like I've been doing this all year long," Ichika confessed.

"Getting beat up by your friends?" Kail asked with pity in his voice. "You know, if that's your idea of friendship you should get some better friends."

"No, not that, they're all good people," Ichika quickly defended his friends. "It's just some of them can't really deal with their anger without resorting to violence. And I'd rather draw their anger than have them unleash it on anyone else."

"How kind of you, but you know you can't baby those two forever," Kail cut to the chase, singling out the two girls he knew had attacked Ichika outside of IS. "I guess you can marry the two and keep an eye on them that way, but polygamy isn't legal in this world, right?"

"No, not in most places. But how will marriage fix their anger problems?"

"Seriously? You're going to ignore this too?"

"Ignore what?" Ichika had no idea what Kail was trying to allude to.

Kail sighed exasperatedly. "Never mind, either you're in denial or you're just really dense."

Ichika snorted. "You know, I can't take that as anything but an insult. I'll save an ass-kick for you after the mission, so don't die on me. What time is it, anyways?"

Rin had confiscated his phone to delete the recording. She'd return it to him during the walk to the cafeteria, so Ichika and Kail were killing time in their room waiting for her.

"Minute to. You'll definitely be late," Kail reported, looking at his own cell.

"Damn. Cecilia and Charlotte will be mad at me."

"Least they won't attack you."

"Even more so I should avoid getting them mad. It's not healthy to bottle up anger like that."

"Way too nice, Ichika."

"Not nice, afraid. You have no idea what an angry Charlotte looks like." Ichika shuddered at the memory.

"Well, I ran out of things to talk about, so I guess I'll go bathe myself," Kail decided, and rummaged through his dresser for his own uniform.

"Make sure you empty out the basket," Ichika reminded him and exited the room to give him some privacy. He decided to walk to Rin's room, maybe remind her that lunch was soon.

As soon as he arrived, he immediately examined Rin's door. Sure enough, there was no damage or evidence of breaking in. Ichika realized it had to be magic, Kail's Alteration at work. He knocked a couple of times. The sound it made verified that the door was solid.

After a few seconds, Rin opened the door. "Yes?" she asked, as if answering Ichika's thoughtless knock.

"Uhh...You ready?" he asked thinking quickly.

"Well, I wanted to dry off a bit more, but I guess they can dry on the way," Rin admitted before closing the door and shaking her twin tails. She smiled up at Ichika. That smile was a bit unnerving to Ichika, since that same smile was used in delivering Ichika's earlier beat down.

As if making an offering to the gods, Rin held Ichika's phone within cupped hands, holding it up to his face.

"Thanks," he said guardedly, not sure if this was a trick or something.

"Don't mention it," Rin chirped, as if she had done him a favor by confiscating his phone.

Then, with a quick fist, she grabbed Ichika's collar and brought his face down to her eye level.

"But if you ever try to covertly do something perverted like that again, remember that there's a little reminder of that punishment on your cell," Rin warned.

"Right, right, but it was just an accident. I was going to turn it off when I arrived but I got distracted."

"Either way, understand that a girl's wrath isn't easily dissuaded."

Rin released Ichika's collar and led the way to the cafeteria, a satisfied smile on her face.

At the cafeteria, Ichika was met with a simultaneous chastisement: "You're late!"

After letting Rin take a seat, he apologized to the people he had made wait: Houki, Laura, Charlotte, Cecilia... and Emiya Sakura-san?

"Emiya Sakura-san, I didn't realize I had disrespected you as well," Ichika commented as he took the empty space beside Charlotte and Cecilia at the round table. Unfortunately, the table only had 6 seats, so Emiya had taken a seat at an adjacent table, turning in her seat enough to face Ichika.

"Fu-fu-fu, please, call me Emiya, I'm very attached to the name," She giggled. It was similar to Houki's scary laugh but it felt more like a teasing laugh than anything else. "And of course you did. By being late to the meal, you've disrespected the freshness of the food, and in doing so disrespected your chefs Charlotte-san and Cecilia-san. And in disrespecting these two, you disrespect me, who, out of the goodness of my heart, assisted them with bringing out the full flavor of their dishes."

"More like took it over," Cecilia grumbled to Ichika's left.

"Now, now, Cecilia-san," Charlotte tried to calm her down while meeting Ichika's eyes seriously. "I tried your dishes already, and all Emiya-san did was enhance it's flavor."

Ichika translated in his head, _oh my god, she saved the meal!_

With a grateful nod towards both Charlotte and Emiya, Ichika gazed at the spread of food in front of him. In serving sizes of about 7-8 each, he saw a light salad drizzled with bacon bits (to which Charlotte nodded her head), a plate full of familiar-looking sandwiches (which had to be Cecilia), some sort of steamed seasoned poultry (Charlotte), and a pressure cooker that had a presence Ichika's gut translated as impending doom.

"Ah, that's my magnum opus," Cecilia announced, noticing Ichika's stare. "I didn't allow neither Charlotte nor Emiya-san to assist me with this dish. It's the center-piece to this meal, everything else is meant to lead up to this final piece! It's not exactly the best presentation, I admit, but the pressure cooker should prevent anyone from guessing the 'bride's flavor' within!"

At this declaration, Houki, Charlotte, Laura, and Emiya tried to cough discreetly. Unfortunately, all it did was draw attention to the phrase Cecilia used.

"Ehh? What's that?" Rin, seated directly next to Cecilia, asked eagerly.

Ichika looked to the four other girls for an explanation, but to his surprise it was Emiya-san who answered.

"A long time ago, back when Japanese women were expected to be totally submissive to their husbands, it was common sense for the potential wife of a man to be able to cook food to her husbands tastes. Hence, the 'bride's flavor'," Emiya explained. "However, with today's culture being so female-favoring due to IS, the more romantic women have resurrected the idea that women should be a tad more considerate towards their mates, and think of their taste when cooking. So far, according to demographic studies, women who have married and practiced the concept have reported more happiness with their mates than those who did not believe in it."

"Interesting," Ichika admitted. "I didn't know one could look at emotions objectively like that."

All at once, the girls slapped their heads in dismay.

"What? What did I say?" a startled Ichika asked for explanation.

"No, no, it's nothing," Emiya excused their collective behavior. "Yes, a statistical study was performed, but the study itself was filled with subjective questions, usually asking how happy a person was with a scale of some sort. In any case, it's just a trend, it's not necessarily true for all couples. It just means that there's a greater probability of happiness between couples practicing the idea. And it's not just 'brides' nor is it just 'flavor'. The present meaning of the term 'bride's flavor' is simply mutual consideration. Each partner works towards the happiness of the other, and takes happiness from that consideration."

"That sounds wonderful!" Rin exclaimed. But it seemed to Ichika that sentiment wasn't shared by the others.

The lack of agreement had also been notice by Rin. "What?"

"Rin," Charlotte began gently, "For our situation, there's a certain factor that makes the 'bride's flavor' impossible."

The four girls besides Rin turned at once to face Ichika, a serious gaze in each of their eyes.

"What? Don't look at me like I'm stupid, it's simple: all you gotta do is work for someone's happiness and have the work returned for you. Give and take towards mutual happiness. Sounds great to me. I'm sure you'll all find someone like that."

Thud! All at once the five girls smashed their heads into the table.

"Ok...I think we should eat now," Ichika suggested, with a worried look upon his face. "If you all are so hungry you'd faint, I think we should eat right away. You know, stop disrespecting the food and all."

"Oh my, Ichika-san, I heard you were dense, but I never dreamed it wasn't this bad," Emiya giggled. "You're just like my husband. He was also quite a dense dummyhead when it came to romance."

"Who's a dense dummyhead?"

From behind Ichika, Kail – Sever in company – had called out his question from the cafeteria entrance.

"Who else?" Houki, sitting directly opposite Ichika, sighed, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

"Oh come on!" complained Ichika. "I understood it just fine. Emiya-san, I did, right?"

"Well, yes, but..." Emiya trailed off, unable to complete her thought.

"Understood what?"

"The 'bride's flavor'." Ichika reported.

CRASH!

Somehow, Sever tripped over his own two feet and took a heavy fall to the chin. Ichika flinched with empathy as he imagined the pain he must have been feeling right now. Of course, this was also the man with a stupid high pain tolerance and the one who taught him Reinforcement. He'd recover about...

"Let me get this straight," Sever attempted to summarize the relatively little amount of information he just received. "You were discussing the 'bride's flavor' in front of your female friends, and the understanding you came to is:?"

"That they'll all find someone to share that kind of sentiment with eventually," Ichika finished off the summary.

Thud!

Sever headbutted the ground with his forehead.

"You know you can use your arms to help you get off the ground," Ichika reminded him.

"Thanks," Sever said sarcastically as he removed himself from the floor and took a seat aside Emiya on the adjacent table. It might have been his imagination, but in a low voice Ichika doubted he heard correctly, he thought his roommate had called him a dense dummyhead.

"But I'm surprised that you guys know about the 'bride's flavor', considering the power balance between men and women with IS," Sever observed. "I mean, regardless of the direction of the subservience, a power balance between two people dooms a relationship to failure, unless one of them is so helpless that it naturally forms a power imbalance. And even then, it becomes more like a parental relationship."

"Sever-san, was it?" Emiya confirmed the newcomer's name. "It sounds like you've had some experience with relationships."

"Just the one," he confirmed, before Ichika jumped in his seat to catch Sever in a headlock.

He whispered in his roommate's ear, _Watch what you say!_

"And that's all I care to say about the subject," Sever finished, his voice muffled by Ichika's arm. "Let's eat!"

Ichika returned to his seat to reach for a sandwich when his hand was arrested by Cecilia's firm grip. "Ichika, what do you have to do with Sever-san's love life?"

"Cecilia, it's...uh...private. Guy talk...I guess?"

"Guy talk? Not likely," Houki objected. Ichika groaned, Sever's careless slip of the tongue had opened up a can of worms. Why did women have to be so interested in the relationships of others?

"So who was the girl?" Charlotte cut in. "Oh wait, it was when you were pretending to be a girl, right? Was it a boy?"

"Ooh, now I need to hear this..." Cecilia opined.

"This is ridiculous, we should be eating instead of gossiping about our comrade's love life like this," Laura complained. But Ichika couldn't help but notice how much she had leaned in, as she was furthest from the current man of interest.

"Now, now, I'd hate for this food to get cold. Ms. Alcott, Ms. Dunois, you both prepared the food, right? It smells heavenly, 'bride's flavor' and all that," Sever tried to divert their attention away from his past relationship.

"Not a chance, Sever-san," added Emiya. "This is relevant to my interests, fu fu fu."

"Was it that Madoka girl?" Rin suggested.

The room went quiet as they witnessed Sever's bewildered gape get cartoonishly large. Bereft of the gift of speech, Ichika supplied the line Sever probably wanted to ask. "How do you know that name?"

Sever's jaw wobbled, then tried to exercise its lockjaw away. After a few seconds of hilarious funny faces, Sever finally repeated, "How did you know Madoka's name?"

Rin faced Sever, coincidentally in the seat closest to him. "I heard your 'guy talk'. So who is Madoka? No one in our school is registered under that name, nor does it seem to be a nickname."

Rin's face went serious. Everyone else was interested simply due to the fact it was a relationship story, however Rin seemed to have stake in this story now that she had gotten a chance to investigate a bit. She probably got that chance when she returned to her room.

"You heard me say that?" Sever's voice trembled, as if he was caught behind a wall and a hard place. Suddenly, he calmed down and thought out loud for a second. "But the only time you could have overheard me talking to Ichika about it would be this...Ichika! Your cell!"

Ichika had caught onto Sever's train of thought early and had his cell ready to throw as soon as he arrived at the same conclusion. As soon as he caught it, Sever began desperately pouring through the menus, probably navigating through the icons rather than actually reading the text.

"Humph," Rin snorted, closing her eyes with full confidence in herself. "I already deleted that part of the video."

Ichika looked to the other girls. He could almost imagine their brains about to burst with questions, especially due to being excluded from this intense match of wills between the Investigative Rin and the Mysterious Sever. But suddenly, Sever smiled and pulled out his own cell, the same model as Ichika's.

Ichika smiled as well, and announced, "Sever-san, have you found something?"

Ichika enjoyed Rin going from proud confidence to devastating shock as Sever replayed a certain video clip on mute to Rin's slowly widening eyes. She swiped at Sever's cell, who quickly drew it out of her reach, then tossed Ichika's back to him. With Cecilia in the way and Sever extending his cell away from Rin, she had no way to access the data on either of the boy's phones.

"I deleted that!" She shrieked.

"The wrong part, apparently," Sever observed. "Now I have something to negotiate."

"There's nothing to negotiate, you p-"

"I guess that's why you called it a 'reward' than a 'punishment'," Sever interrupted.

Rin's face lit up red with embarrassment. "Fine, I'll drop the 'Madoka' investigation," she offered, almost to tears with embarrassment. Ichika knew that at this point, the argument was over. "Just let me erase the data from your phones."

"Agreed," Sever jumped on the offer immediately. Ichika gave him a nod of thanks, that Sever returned with one of understanding.

Rin sighed with relief as she took both their cells, only to squeal in shock as Emiya reached over and plucked them out of her hands.

She turned to Sever and confessed, "I'm sorry, Sever-san, but I have to know. Earlier, you mentioned your dislike for the idea of the 'bride's flavor', the old idea of subservience popular a half century or so ago. If you had such dislike for that notion, what kind of relationship did you have with this Madoka-san? And how did it end?"

Ichika could tell that this was the question that had weighed heaviest on everyone's mind: Did it have a happy end and how did he get that far? But Ichika knew the answer, and also that Sever loved Madoka so much he couldn't bear to tell a lie about her. Which meant he had only one option.

"Madoka and I were as equal as we could be. She had her weaknesses that I compensated for with my strengths. As for my weakness, well she more than made up for them. I lived my life using her as my model for success, and she worked as hard as she could to remain the model for me to use. At times, it felt like a competition between us, who could improve faster than the other. I wouldn't say the power between us was perfectly balanced, but the one thing that reminded true for us is that all my improvement was done so that she could rest a bit more than normal, and all hers was done to make mine slightly easier. I guess it was a relationship where she was all I was, and I was all of hers.

"But it hasn't ended. She still with me, even now. And I swear, after I finish here, I'll return to her, an even stronger man than I was back then. And maybe I can be the one to work hard to make her work easier."

Sever stared wistfully through the window into the open sky. Ichika wondered exactly how much of the truth he had twisted and left out. The girls had lowered their heads in contemplation, while Emiya openly praised her table-mate, simultaneously depositing the cells into Rin's hands. "That's good, that's good! Such a man! I'm so happy to met a person like you! In fact, you're quite similar to me!"

"Oh?" Cecilia recovered first, Ichika noticed her furtively wiping a tear from her eye. "Emiya-san, do you have someone to return to?"

The other girls raised their heads as well, save the distracted Rin, with this new bit of information.

Emiya thought for a second, and then admitted, "Yes, I do. I don't mind talking about it, but I'm sure our stomachs would like some attentions first, fu-fu-fu."

Ichika's stomach took the opportunity to rumble for the third time today, louder than ever. "Yes, I think it would agree, Emiya-san."

"Thanks for the food!" the eight chorused after splitting up the food.

Amazingly enough, all the food was delicious, even Cecilia's sandwiches. Due to the bet with Rin, Ichika dug into them first, figuring if he did end up vomiting, he wouldn't throw up any of Charlotte's food. However, after his first petite bite, he found himself devouring the rest of the sandwich triangle in large bites, then moving to the second, and finally the third in gigantic chomps. He followed it up with a large sip of iced tea, and exclaimed to the chef on his left, "Cecilia, that was incredible! The ham was fried perfectly, and that dressing you added gave the vegetables a flavor all on their own. It was like a meal all in itself!"

Cecilia flushed, a proud smile appearing on her face, "Of course it is! England is the king of cold food! It's but a trifle for me!"

"But you fried the ham," Rin mumbled as Emiya made a cutting motion across her neck, trying to kill the conversation before Cecilia...

"Well, of course _I_ didn't want to fry the ham," Cecilia complained, "England is the home of cold cuts so I insisted that the ham be cut fresh from the flank, but Emiya-san jumped in and had me fry it-"

"Well, Ichika, how about we try my contribution next?" Charlotte offered, interrupting Cecilia's tirade mid-sentence.

"Sounds like a plan, I've got maybe half a stomach left," Ichika patted his stomach.

"Oh, don't you normally eat more?" Houki asked.

"I don't know what you mean, Houki," Ichika answered, looking across the table. But it wasn't Houki he was making eye contact with. Houki followed Ichika's nervous eyes to the centerpiece, the pressure cooker Cecilia had prepared with the intent of being the final meal.

"Ah."

"In any case," Charlotte continued, "let's try my dish." Charlotte directed them to pierce the thinly cut of meat (steamed pheasant, apparently), and with the poultry still skewered grab some salad with the fork. This way, the heat from the meat wouldn't mess up the salad, and each bite would have a perfect balance of heat and cold.

"This is also amazing!" Ichika gushed. "I had no idea the competition between heat and cold would have a flavor in of itself! And the salad itself is light, a perfect compliment to the heavy pheasant! It's a wonderfully balanced meal!"

Charlotte pressed her fingertips together, a sign of humble accomplishment. "If you'd like, I could make this for you every day..."

"Aah, pass," Ichika rejected the notion. "I'm can cook too, you know. I know that even the best dish will lose its taste the more often you eat. I'd prefer a variety of foods, myself."

"Oh, mou!" Charlotte moaned, hiding her face in her lap.

"She overextended," Houki analyzed.

"A bit too far," Rin agreed.

"A bit too early I'd say," Cecilia added.

"Even I saw that coming," Laura confessed, patting Charlotte's back supportively.

"You know, to prevent cramps you should str-"

"Ichika, I know you're just trying to help," Sever interrupted Ichika's advice, "but unless you'd like for everyone to eat this delicious salad with their faces I'd refrain from completing that sentence."

"Well, fine then," Ichika pouted, not fully understanding why Sever chose this, out of all times, to insult him so.

"No, it's fine." Charlotte peeked up from her lap to smile at Ichika. "Next time, I'll make sure to stretch before any strenuous activity."

"Char..." Ichika started, touched by her gentle understanding.

"Ah, she made it up," Houki reported.

"With a nickname bonus," Cecilia observed.

"So what, he calls me Rin all the time," Rin dismissed the observation.

"You have us all call you that," Laura pointed out.

"Fu fu fu, that's a fun game you five are playing," Emiya giggled.

"And Ichika's the referee, whether he knows it or not," Sever added.

"I swear, after this mission I'll have you explain precisely what just happen this lunch and why I've been the butt of so many jokes," Ichika promised.

"The mission!" Laura checked her watch. "We should get going, we have 15 minutes before the appointed meeting time."

Ichika and the others stated to gather the dishes when Emiya stopped them, saying, "Oh no, you should go ahead and get ready for the mission. I can take care of these dishes right away."

"Oh no, we could use the exercise," Ichika insisted.

"Oh," Houki added, "if you wouldn't mind, could you tell us about your partner?"

"Oh yeah!" the other girls exclaimed, having forgotten about Emiya's own love story after sampling Cecilia's and Charlotte's culinary effort.

"And what about my magnum opus?" Cecilia whined. With that, she immediately unlocked the top of the pressure cooker. Within microseconds, an acrid smell filled the air. Ichika, Houki, Rin, Laura, and Charlotte all backed away from the pot.

"What's up with you five?" Sever asked.

_How are you still standing at ground zero? _Ichika questioned Sever silently.

"Nothing, it's just that burst of heat made us back away a bit," Houki lied, a lie the other four found themselves applying to.

"Fu fu fu, it wasn't that bad," Emiya-san challenged, wearing the world's greatest poker-face.

"In any case, no one's leaving until someone's tasted my 'bride's flavor'," Cecilia ordered, rapping a wooden ladle against the pot.

CLUG! Something turned over within the pot, exposing itself over the side for just a second before disappearing. But for an athlete with dynamic vision like Ichika, that was like an eternity. He could clearly see that what had turned was the skeleton of a fish, swimming in a thick goop of a black tar broth. It was so thick that strands of it made tiny webs between the major bones of the part of the fish he had seen.

"Is it a stew?" Ichika ventured a guess.

"Why, yes!" Cecilia exclaimed, delighted from Ichika's apparently correct guess. "We are also known for our stews, cooking them for so long that the meat become tender enough to fall off the bone."

"It takes a long time to cook?" Laura repeated.

"Yes, about 4-10 hours at low heat depending on the meat," Cecilia answered.

"But we only had an hour or so to cook," Charlotte brought up. "How did you, uh, stew anything so quickly?"

"Well," Cecilia brought the ladle to her head and used the clean handle to wipe a few strands of hair from her face, then assumed the pose of a teacher with the ladle as a pointer, "I had found some fish deep in the freezer in a box, still with a shipping label on it. It must have been freshly delivered to still be in its packaging, so I took a couple and put it into the pressure cooker, along with some water and veggies.

"I knew that fish was the quickest to stew at about 4 hours in general, so I simply quadrupled the heat and made sure the fish tenderized properly."

"And how did you make sure it was properly tenderized?" Rin asked.

"Well, fish bones float, right?" Cecilia confirmed. "I simply peeked in and made sure I could see the skeleton. The soy sauce I added made the stew really dark, so it was easy to see the spots of white from the fish skeletons."

Ichika massaged his head, trying to endure the headache the mere mention of the atrocities to food this amateur chef had casually explained.

"Uh, this was very informative, Ms. Alcott, but unfortunately we have 12 minutes before we have to assemble for the mission," Laura reminded her.

"But, but my food!" Cecilia protested.

"Fine, it can be anybody right?" Sever had finally had enough. He grabbed the ladle and carefully scooped the dark concoction into it. With that same careful movement, he swiftly drank the brew, controlling it well so it didn't drip onto his uniform. After finishing the ladle full, he said, "Yes, the fish was tender and the stew itself had a deep flavor. I'd invite everyone to try, but as Ms. Bodewig mentioned we have little time."

Ichika took the chance Sever gave them and bowed to Emiya, "Sever's right. I apologize for not being able to help like I insisted, but it seems you'll have to clean up for us. At the very least, Sever and I can carry the pressure cooker for you."

Sever nodded his consent, as Cecilia was dragged away by Rin and Houki, wailing, "But my 'bride's flavor'!" Laura and Charlotte followed after, both having to support each other as the exited the room.

Ichika turned to Sever, who nodded. They carried the "stew" to the sink as Emiya turned on the garbage disposal.

The two boys tipped the concoction down the drain, wincing in pain as the disposal squealed in apparent pain and torture as it attempted to grind the remains into tiny bits. After the deed had been done, Ichika mentioned to Sever, "I can't believe you could keep that down."

Sever winced, and with a disappointed tone in his voice, he chastised him, "Ichika, I can't believe you'd dismiss the efforts of one of your friends so callously, especially after she specifically mentioned putting her 'bride's flavor' into it. You should have a bit more faith in her. After all, she did make those sandwiches."

"That I helped with," Emiya reminded him.

"Well then, what did it taste like?" Ichika asked. "We just tossed everything away, and I'm not keen on licking that ladle in your hand."

Sever looked at the ladle he had eaten the stew with, and nonchalantly tossed it into the sink. Immediately, Ichika's gut warned him that magic was just used nearby. It was a small amount, not enough to affect reality or even to be noticed by normal people, but Ichika had learned to trust his gut when it came to this kind of thing. He looked to the only other source of magecraft in the world, who had suddenly dropped to his knees in shock.

"Oh man... it tasted like that?" Sever mumbled.

"Sever-san? What's wrong?" Emiya crouched down by Sever, checking for any sign of physical reaction to the Black Death he had willingly imbibed.

"Nothing, nothing, just the aftertaste...it was...delayed."

"And?" Ichika wondered.

"I've never felt more pity for a machine than I now do for that disposal," Sever solemnly admitted, even putting his hands together in prayer.

Ichika understood the feeling and did the same. He noted that Emiya had also copied them, although she seemed more entertained by the idea rather than empathizing with the tool.

"OK, enough of this, we still have to catch up to the girls," Sever remembered.

"Will you be OK?" Emiya called after him.

"No worries," Ichika called back. "He's the hardiest man I've ever met."

He's also got the most secrets out of anyone he had ever met, as well. Things weren't adding up, and he had gotten sloppy with his cover story. Ichika made one more promise to himself: after the mission, he'd drag an explanation for each discontinuity he had observed these past two days, starting with the discolored sub-dermis underneath his skin.


End file.
